m 


3  1210  01970  4517 


MONCKTOH  :ION:ES 


THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 

RIVERSIDE 


Ex  Libris            I 
;    C.  K.  OGDEN    j 

Life   in   Old    Cambridge 


LIFE   IN 

^         — 

OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

Illustrations  of  English  History 


M.   E.   MONCKTON   JONES 

With  Preface  by  G.  K.  CHESTERTON 


MAPS    AND    ILLUSTRATIONS 


CAMBRIDGE 

W.    HEFFER  6?  SONS   LTD. 

1920 


-DA  63  0 
C2SJ45 


Contents 


CHAP.  PAGB 

Illustrations            -  -  -    vii 

Author's  Preface  -     ix 

Introduction    -  xiii 

I.    The  Grassland  Strip  -  -      1 

II.    The  Romans     -        -  -  -     15 

III.  The  Province  -        -  -  -    21 

IV.  Saxon  Times     -        -  -  -    31 
V.    The  Danes       -        -  -  -    55 

VI.    The  Norman  Years  -  -    74 

VII.     Medieval  Cambridge  -  -    86 

VIII.    Monks  and  Friars   -  -  -  100 


Illustrations 


PAGE 

Map  of  Fen  and  Forest        ...  Frontispiece 
Compiled  by  L.  Grimes  in  the  style  of  the  17th 
Century  explorers) 

Late  Celtic  Vessel  and  Kimmeridge  Shale 

Urn  -  7 

(Camb.  Arch.  Museum) 

Gold  Armilla  and  Process  of  Making  it     -  8 

(From  photo  in  Camb.  Arch.  Museum) 

Torque,  Spearhead,  Celt  and  Celt  Moulds  9 

(Camb.  Arch.   Museum) 

Fleam  Dyke  12 

(From  a  photograph) 

British  Shield 15 

(Camb.  Arch.  Museum) 

Bronze  of  a  Roman  Soldier    -   -   -   18 

(From  Babington's  Ancient  Cambridgeshire,  p.  77) 

Roman  Pottery 24 

(Camb.  Arch.  Museum) 

Roman  Fibula  and  Knife  25 

(Camb.  Arch.  Museum) 

Anglo-Saxon  Seaxe,  and  Bill  34 

(Camb.  Arch.  Museum) 

Anglo-Saxon  Fibula  and  Clasps  35 

(Camb.  Arch.  Museum) 

Old  Cottages  now  standing  at  Cherryhinton        36 

(From  sketch  by  P.  Johnstone) 


Viii  ILLUSTRATIONS 


PAGE 


North    Doorway    of    Our    Lady's    Chapel, 

Stourbridge       ------        40 

Saxon  Vessel.    Roman  Vessels  46 

(Camb.  Arch.  Museum) 

Saxon  Brooch  ------        51 

(Camb.  Arch.  Museum) 

Saxon  Spindle -Whorls  and  Cloth         -        -        52 

(Camb.  Arch.  Museum) 

Saxon  Disc  Ornament     -----        63 

(Camb.   Arch.   Museum) 

Tower  of  St.  Benet's      -----        67 

(From  a  sketch  by  P.  Johnstone) 

Castle  Hill      -------        87 

(From  old  illustrations  of  Cambridge  and  Bramber) 

Thatched  Church    ------        90 

(From  a  sketch  by  P.  Johnstone) 

Map  of  Cambridge  in  1300      -        -        -  101 

(From  J.  W.  Clark,  Ecclesia  de   Barnwell,   facing 
p.  336) 

Plan  of  Cambridge  Castle     -        -        -        -      114 

(From  print  made  for  S.  Hooper,  1776) 

View  of  Cambridge  Castle     -        -        -        -      117 

(From  print  made  for  S.  Hooper,   1776) 

Plan  of  Stourbridge  Fair      ...        -      128 

(From  History  and  Antiquities  of  Barnwell,  Cam- 
bridge Free  Library) 


Author's  Preface 

This  sketch  of  early  life  in  Cambridge  has 
been  compiled  in  reply  to  a  want  expressed 
in  the  elementary  schools  of  the  town.  The 
many  admirable  volumes  existing  on  Cam- 
bridge have  been  written  by  scholars  for 
adult  and  educated  readers.  They  are  un- 
happily for  the  most  part  inaccessible  and 
unintelligible  to  the  children.  Yet  a  know- 
ledge of  the  factors  and  the  actors  which  have 
made  up  the  life  of  the  past  is  the  best  means 
of  arousing  that  community  sentiment  on 
which  can  be  based  the  co-operation  of  good 
citizens  in  the  future. 

East  Anglia  plays,  perhaps,  the  next 
greatest  part  to  London  in  the  Middle  Ages 
especially  in  trade  and  political  intercourse 
with  Flanders  and  the  Empire,  and  all  this  is 
reflected  in  the  life  of  the  town,  under  Saxons, 
Danes,  Normans  and  Angevins.  To  give  the 
actual  writs  and  regulations  of  those  rulers 
to  a  boy,  who  hardly  understands  their 
wording  is  more  worth  doing  than  it  seems, 
for  it  is  often  to  awaken  in  him  for  the  first 
time  a  sense  that  History  describes  the  lives 
of  real  people  whose  influence  may  still  affect 
his  life  to-day.    For  Local  History  consists  of 


X  AUTHOR  S     PREFACE 

detail,  and  it  is  detail,  not  generalities,  which 
a  child  can  grasp,  and  about  which  his  keen 
imagination  loves  to  play.  The  legends  of 
Cnut,  of  Britnoth,  of  Hereward  ;  the  doings 
of  Friar  or  Canon,  of  Sheriff  Picot  or  King 
John  give  them  actual  dramatis  persona?  for 
the  stage  of  their  constant  mental  plays,  but 
these  characters  cannot  be  given  without  some 
ordered  background. 

To  sketch  such  a  background  without 
offending  against  the  dim  truths  of  Archaeology 
or  contracting  the  due  sequence  of  time  ;  to 
write  it  in  language  which  will  not  flow  un- 
heeded over  the  child's  head,  involves  diffi- 
culties which  those  will  understand  who  have 
attempted  it,  and  which  constantly  lay  the 
writer  open  to  charges  of  inaccuracy,  the  more 
just  in  this  case  since  she  is  qualified  neither 
by  long  residence  nor  special  study  of  Cam- 
bridge, but  has  had  to  build  on  the  work  of 
others.  In  stay  of  scholars'  judgment,  she 
would  urge  that  they  should  speedily  meet 
the  need  with  more  authority  and  simplicity. 

Most  valuable  help  has  been  drawn  from 
Cooper's  "  Annals  of  Cambridge,"  Stubb's 
"  Cambridge,"  Conybeare's  "  Cambridge- 
shire," and  Mr.  A.  Gray's  "  Cambridge,"  and 
his  pamphlets  in  the  Cambridge  Antiquarian 
Society's  publications.  To  Mr.  Gray  I  am 
more  especially  grateful  for  his  great  kindness 
in  reading  the  manuscript  and  putting  me 
right  on  important  points.     I  rejoice  to  have 


AUTHOR  S    PREFACE  xi 

this  opportunity  of  thanking  Mr.  Harold 
Peake  for  similar  help  in  Chapter  I.  ;  the 
Cambridge  Antiquarian  Society  and  Baron 
von  Hugel  for  their  kindness  in  permitting  me 
to  use  illustrations  from  their  library  and 
copies  of  objects  in  the  Archaeological  Museum, 
the  Committee  of  the  Free  Library  for  the 
plan  of  Barnwell  Fair  ;  Father  Cuthbert  for 
the  use  of  an  extract  from  his  work  on  "  The 
coming  of  the  Friars  Minor,"  and  Messrs. 
Bowes  and  Bowes  for  the  arrangement  by 
which  it  has  been  possible  to  include  passages 
from  J.  W.  Clark's  "  Augustinian  Canons  of 
Barnwell."  To  Miss  P.  Johnstone  my  thanks 
are  given  for  the  illustrations,  which  should, 
it  is  hoped,  provide  children  with  suggestions 
for  handwork. 

Finally,  with  Colet's  words,  I  would  dedi- 
cate my  ill-finished  task  to  the  children: 
"  In  which  little  work  if  any  new  things  be 
of  me,  it  is  alonely  that  I  have  put  these  parts 
in  a  more  clear  order,  and  have  made  them  a 
little  more  easy  to  young  wits  than,  me 
thinketh,  they  were  before.  .  .  .  Wherefore 
all  little  babes,  all  little  children  learn  gladly 
.  .  .  and  lift  up  your  little  white  hands  for 
me." 

M.  E.  Monckton  Jones. 

Barton,  Cambs. 
December  9,   1919. 


Introduction 

I  know  not  by  what  right  I  block  up  the 
Roman  road  of  this  valuable  history  of  Cam- 
bridge, unless  it  be  because  I  have  followed 
it  myself  with  great  pleasure,  by  private 
favour  of  the  author,  or  perhaps  because  my 
surname  happens  to  be  that  of  a  village  in 
the  neighbourhood.  I  have  never  been  to 
Cambridge  except  as  an  admiring  visitor ; 
I  have  never  been  to  Chesterton  at  all ; 
either  from  a  sense  of  unworthiness,  or  from 
a  faint  superstitious  feeling  that  I  might  be 
fulfilling  a  prophecy  in  the  country-side. 
Anyone  with  a  sense  of  the  savour  of  the  old 
English  country  rhymes  and  tales  will  share 
my  vague  alarm  that  the  steeple  might  crack 
or  the  market  cross  fall  down,  for  a  smaller 
thing  than  the  coincidence  of  a  man  named 
Chesterton  going  to  Chesterton.  I  have  never 
really  studied  history  at  Cambridge,  or  any- 
where else.  And  if  I  have  heartily  enjoyed 
this  modern  history  of  Cambridge,  I  fear  it 
is  not  because  it  bears  a  resemblance  to  the 


XIV  INTRODUCTION 

Cambridge  Modern  History.  In  short,  while 
my  qualifications  for  pronouncing  on  the 
point  at  all  are  highly  dubious,  the  strong 
sympathy  I  do  feel  for  the  work  is  mostly  due 
to  its  marked  difference  from  most  academic 
digests.  What  is  the  matter  with  those 
academic  attempts  at  universal  history  is 
that  they  are  generally  so  very  much  the 
reverse  of  universal.  They  assemble  the 
specialists,  so  as  to  cover  all  subjects  except 
the  real  subject.  The  result  is  that  we  only 
succeed  in  having  all  things  studied  in  a 
narrow  spirit,  instead  of  one  thing  studied 
in  a  universal  spirit.  That  is  one  reason  for 
liking  a  thing  like  a  local  history  ;  that  it  is 
a  large  story  about  a  little  thing.  I  prefer 
the  philosophical  results  of  a  man  examining 
a  mole-hill,  rather  than  those  of  a  million 
moles  exploring  a  mountain. 

It  is  to  be  hoped  that  the  example  be 
followed,  touching  many  other  English  dis- 
tricts ;  nor  is  there  any  particular  reason 
why  it  should  not  be  followed  touching  all 
of  them.  It  is  true  that  the  author  of  this 
book  happens  to  have  to  deal  with  one  of  the 
towns  universally  recognised  as  historic  and 


INTRODUCTION  XV 

picturesque,  containing  some  of  the  chief 
monuments  of  medieval  art,  as  well  as 
some  of  the  chief  chairs  of  modern  education. 
But  this  particular  interest  of  the  pageant  of 
successive  periods  really  belongs  less  to  Cam- 
bridge as  Cambridge  than  to  Cambridge  as  a 
country  town.  Even  the  most  urban  towns 
are  mostly  made  up  of  country  towns  ;  that 
is  they  have  grown  by  absorbing  the  surround- 
ing towns  and  villages.  We  are  tempted  in  a 
fanciful  fashion  to  forget  that  sites  at  least 
stand  for  ever,  and  cannot  be  created  or 
destroyed.  It  is  as  if  we  imagined  that 
Brixton  had  appeared  recently  as  a  radiant 
object  in  the  sky,  like  the  New  Jerusalem  ; 
or  that  the  very  earth  on  which  Manchester 
stands  had  been  manufactured  in  the  Man- 
chester factories.  But,  indeed,  Manchester 
itself  is  the  clearest  of  all  cases  to  the  contrary. 
The  Manchester  School  was  credited  with 
being  unhistorical,  or  even  anti-historical ; 
but  the  very  name  of  Manchester  is  a  piece  of 
history,  and  even  of  ancient  and  classical 
history.  There  are  no  new  places  in  Eng- 
land ;  for  there  is  no  such  thing  as  a  new  place 
in  nature,  or  even  in  abstract  logic.    Therefore 


XVI  INTRODUCTION 

there  is  no  reason  why  we  should  not  have 
an  epic  and  almost  prehistoric  history  of 
West  Kensington,  or  the  truth  about  the 
romantic  story  of  Clapham.  It  would  be  the 
same  great  story  of  Rome,  of  the  Church,  of 
the  Crusades,  of  the  great  guilds  like  those 
that  made  the  cathedrals,  if  anyone  had  the 
moral  courage  to  do  for  Clapham  what  the 
lady  who  wrote  this  book  has  done  for  Cam- 
bridge. 

If  I  might  give  one  example  from  this  book, 
out  of  many,  of  the  sort  of  thing  that  is  so 
seriously  wanted  in  a  popular  history,  and 
is  so  seldom  present  in  one,  I  would  adduce 
the  wisdom  of  giving  in  their  regular  order 
the  actual  terms  of  the  charter  which  King 
John  gave  to  the  burghers.  I  do  not  exag- 
gerate when  I  say  I  think  them  far  more 
important  than  the  charter  which  King  John 
gave  to  the  barons.  The  latter  is  always 
called  the  great  charter,  largely  because  it 
was  chiefly  concerned  with  great  lords  ;  but 
this  is  concerned  with  smaller  men,  and 
therefore  with  larger  matters.  It  consists  of 
fourteen  clauses  ;  and  as  we  read  it  we  feel 
passing  before  us  and  around  us  all  the  living 


INTRODUCTION.  xvti 

movement  of  the  Middle  Ages.  Besides  the 
essential  things,  the  general  presence  of  a 
sort  of  ideal  trading,  analogous  to  the  theory 
of  a  just  price,  we  have  a  hundred  little  things 
of  singular  historic  interest,  especially  when 
they  have  since  grown  into  larger  things. 
We  have,  for  instance,  reference  to  certain 
privileges  only  belonging  "  to  the  king's 
moneyers  and  servants  "  ;  the  latter  being 
the  position  of  the  Jews,  and  probably  in- 
volving many  privileges  for  the  Jews.  We 
have  the  curious  feature  of  continual  reference 
to  something  rather  unique  and  characteristic 
of  our  own  history  ;  the  exceptional  role  and 
position  of  the  City  of  London.  There  is 
an  inevitable  reference  to  ale,  which  flows 
as  in  rivers  through  all  such  records  ;  and 
especially  of  an  occasion  when  the  burghers 
were  sternly  confined  to  drinking  only  one 
kind  of  ale,  instead  of  absorbing  all  possible 
kinds  of  ale  in  their  due  succession.  Men  are 
often  confined  to  a  sort  of  "  scot-ale "  in 
the  tied  houses  of  our  own  time  ;  but  to-day 
the  celebration  lasts  all  the  year  round.  In 
short,  the  mere  citation  of  this  medieval 
document  in  detail  gives  the  amateur  reader 


XV111  INTRODUCTION 

like  myself  a  real  glimpse  of  the  medieval 
democracy.  From  the  stock  histories  of  his 
youth  he  would  have  learned  little  or  nothing 
about  that  particular  date,  except  the  extra- 
ordinary wickedness  of  King  John  and  the 
extraordinary  goodness  of  the  British  Consti- 
tution. But  to  those  old  Cambridge  men 
King  John  was  only  the  name  of  the  King 
who  happened  to  give  them  the  glorious  rights 
of  guildsmen.  And  I  very  much  fear  that, 
to  them,  the  modern  thing  called  the  British 
Constitution  would  only  be  the  thing  under 
which  the  rights  and  the  guilds  were  alike 

gone. 

G.  K.  Chesterton. 


Life  in  Old  Cambridge. 


Chapter  I. 

The   Grassland   Strip 

What  was  there  2,000  years  ago  where  Cam- 
bridge now  stands  ?  A  bird  taking  flight 
from  Castle  Hill  would  have  had  below  him  a 
shining  streak  of  waters,  such  as  you  see  when 
the  floods  are  out  on  the  commons.  In 
places  it  would  be  half-a-mile  or  so  across,  but 
if  he  flew  north,  Ely  way,  the  lake  would  run 
into  another  and  another,  each  wider  than 
the  last,  so  that  by  Waterbeach  there  would 
be  a  bay  with  waves  chasing  each  other 
before  the  wind.  Right  away  to  the  Wash 
and  the  sea  were  marshes,  and  a  log  or  raft, 
put  into  the  water  at  Castle  Hill,  could  drift 
on  mile  after  mile  till  it  came  out  on  to  tossing 
seas.1  Cam  and  Ouse  and  their  streamlets  ran 
together  into  a  waste   of  waters  which   cut 

1  See  W.  Stubbs,  Cambridge,  p.  9. 

1 


2  LIFE    IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

off  Norfolk  and  Suffolk  from  the  rest  of 
England,  making  them  almost  an  island. 

Out  of  the  shallow  water  of  the  marsh,  reeds 
and  grasses  grew  thick  and  tall  and  made 
green  banks  on  either  side  of  the  river.  These 
banks  sloped  gently  upwards  and  spread  out 
into  wide  hillsides,  on  which  might  grow  gorse 
and  sloe  and  a  few  may-trees.  Then  among  the 
may-trees  might  come  a  few  birches,  white- 
stemmed  and  dainty,  swinging  in  the  breeze, 
and  here  and  there  a  feathery  ash-tree  or  a 
thickset  oak.  Closer  and  closer  grow  the 
trees,  big  beeches  and  great  dark  oaks  as  the 
hills  rise,  till  presently  all  light  is  shut  out  and 
you  can  only  see  a  yard  or  two  either  way. 
For  many  miles  the  woods  go  on,  covering 
the  hillsides  with  a  dense  coat  of  timber  for 
many  days'  journey  till  they  feel  the  bleak 
east  wind  and  the  salty  air  of  the  North  Sea. 

Now  between  the  forest  and  the  water 
there  lies  only  one  long  narrow  strip  of  open 
grassland,  a  sunny  upland  by  which  men 
could  travel  in  the  daylight,  leaving  the  dark, 
tangled  forest  to  left  and  the  shining  water  to 
right  as  they  ran  southwards  from  the  bracken 
lands  of  Norfolk  towards  the  warmer  uplands 


THE   GRASSLAND    STRIP  3 

that  fence  the  Thames  valley  from  the  North 
winds.  Look  at  it  well,  that  corridor  of  grassy- 
slopes.  Some  forty  miles  it  runs,  flanked  by 
Forest  on  the  one  side,  Fenland  on  the  other. 
It  holds  the  secret  of  the  life  of  Cambridge. 

Whoever  comes  sailing  over  the  chill  North 
Sea,  land  where  he  will  along  the  coast  be- 
tween Thames  and  Ouse  mouths,  he  must 
come  inland  by  that  grassy  slope.  If  he 
leave  ship  at  Lynn  he  cannot  cross  the 
marshes  but  must  wrork  along  their  edges  to 
Brandon  before  he  can  turn  west  and  south. 
If  he  land  at  Harwich  the  Forest  faces  him, 
dark,  tangled,  full  of  beasts,  and  he  must 
work  northward  to  turn  its  outposts  till  he 
comes  to  the  open  passage  at  Brandon.  And 
so  too  if  a  troop  would  find  its  way  to  the  sea 
from  Bedford  or  north  from  London,  the 
Forest  blocks  the  Way  eastwards,  the  Marshes 
bar  it  on  the  north,  only  by  Royston  slopes 
to  Brandon  can  it  pass  to  the  east  and  the  sea. 

That  was  the  Open  Road,  "  over  the  hills 
and  far  away  "  ;  everyone  out  of  East  Ahglia 
seeking  his  fortune  in  the  world  must  tread 
the  springy  turf  of  the  Brandon  and  Royston 
uplands. 


4  LIFE    IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

On  the  sunny  south-looking  slopes  of  the 
chalk  hills  lay  the  pit-dwellings  of  the  first 
men.  To  try  to  live  lower  down  in  the  valleys 
was  dangerous,  for  often  the  water  would  rise 
and  soak  the  soil,  and  any  huts  or  camps  they 
had  made  would  be  washed  away.  It  was  a 
pity,  for  the  grass  down  there  was  longer  and 
richer  than  on  the  hillsides  ;  in  the  lakes  too 
and  rivers  were  man}?-  fish  and  wild  duck  to  be 
caught  by  those  who  knew  how,  and  so  after 
a  time  men  did  try  to  live  down  there  in  spite 
of  the  danger.  Leading  down  to  the  river  was 
a  strip  of  gravel,  and  here  and  there  it  spread 
out  into  a  patch  of  drier  ground,  a  little  hillock 
standing  perhaps  a  few  feet  higher  than  the 
grass  elsewhere  ;  there  they  would  dig  out  a 
flat  floor  for  a  hut,  throwing  the  earth  up  in  a 
little  round  wall  into  which  they  thrust 
strong  branches  to  meet  overhead  as  a  roof. 
The  spaces  between  them  they  blocked  with 
more  earth  mixed  with  reeds  or  grass,  and 
thatched  the  top  with  reeds.  When  it  rained 
for  days  together  the  mud  walls  began  to 
melt ;  then  the  marsh  water  too  was  swollen 
and  rose.  They  were  so  often  washed  away 
that  at  last  they  found  a  way  to  protect  their 


THE   GRASSLAND   STRIP  5 

huts.  All  round  the  dry  patch  or  hillock, 
on  which  their  huts  were  crowded  together, 
the  men  would  dig  a  ditch  deep  enough  to 
carry  off  flood  water,  and  with  the  soil  that 
they  dug  out  they  threw  up  a  great  bank. 
Such  a  place,  perhaps,  was  once  the  spot  we 
now  call  Cambridge  ;  flat  as  it  looks  it  must 
have  stood  above  the  surrounding  marsh  when 
first  men  built  their  huts  there. 

Beside  the  group  of  huts  ran  the  Cam,  a  long, 
winding  chain  of  lakes  and  bogs,  and  beyond 
it  the  sun  would  set  behind  a  big  hillside.  If 
you  could  get  across  the  water  and  scramble 
up  the  hill  you  would  find  the  land  still  rising 
slowly  as  you  went  west  away.  Where  the 
river  ran  round  the  foot  of  the  hill  it  was  easy 
to  cross,  for  the  bottom  was  gravel.  A  ridge 
of  gravel  began  there  and  passed  by  the  huts 
and  back  all  the  way  to  the  grassland  slopes  of 
the  Gogs.  From  the  Wash  southwards  this 
was  the  first  place  where  you  could  cross  the 
marshes. 

There  between  the  river  and  the  grasslands 
the  first  dwellers  in  our  district,  little  wiry 
men  whose  ancestors  had  come  from  warm 
lands  in  the  south  of  Europe  made  their  home, 


6  LIFE   IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

many  thousand  years  ago.  They  were  very 
short,  with  long,  egg-shaped  heads,  fine 
black  hair  and  beard  and  sharp  features.  From 
the  hill  their  keen  sight  might  often  pick  out 
a  troop  of  men  and  cattle,  moving  along  the 
grassway  on  the  slopes  of  the  Gogs,  seeking 
new  pasture  or  going  to  chaffer  for  flints  at 
the  Royston  pit,  or  northwards  to  Grimes 
Graves  at  Brandon. 

Such  a  troop  running  lightly  afoot  soon  beat 
out  a  track  over  the  hillsides,  winding  here 
to  avoid  a  rough  growth  of  thorn-scrub  and 
oak-tree,  mounting  higher  there  to  escape 
from  the  muddy  margin  of  a  marsh  or  stream- 
let, and  marked  along  its  course  by  mounds 
raised  to  cover  the  bones  of  mighty  chiefs  or 
to  guide  strange  wayfarers. 

Such  was  the  country  round  Cambridge 
in  the  New  Stone  Age  and  Bronze  Age.  To  the 
north-east  were  the  Brakelands  (Norfolk  and 
Suffolk),  open  common  and  heath.  There 
the  early  men  clustered  around  the  flinty 
gravel  pit  or  chalk  quarry,  fed  their  reindeer 
and  the  little,  long-horned  oxen  on  the 
grasses  and  mosses,  and  traded  in  cattle, 
hides,  pottery  and  basket-work.     To  chaffer 


8 


LIFE   IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 


with  them  came  other  groups  of  the  same 
people  from  the  southern  valleys.  These 
had  travelled  along  the  upland  Ridgeways 
from  Chiltern  and  the  Berkshire  Downs,  and 
even  distant  Stonehenge  or  Avebury,  bringing 
beads  of  the  beautiful  Irish  gold  or  lumps  of 
tin  and  perhaps  lead  from  Cornwall  and  the 
West. 

These  old  grass  ways  of  the  stone  users  can 
still  be  traced  and  in  Berks  and  Wilts  they 
still  sweep  on  for  mile  after  mile  over  the 
wide  downs  paved  with  soft  springy  green 
turf  and  thyme. 


Ftocoes  of  ToaWpa 
0*  <5<M.  -VnjilU. 


Gold  Aomtta  .froipGruutylw) . 
(1) 


For  centuries  the  Stone  and  Bronze  users 
held  the  land,  learning  by  degrees  how  to  burn 
the  grass  and  scratch  the  surface  of  the  hill 

1  The  original  is  in  the  Fitzwilliam  Museum. 


THE   GRASSLAND    STRIP 


9 


sides,  so  that  grains  of  corn  would  grow  into  a 
sparse  crop  to  make  them  bread.  But  at 
long  last  the  news  of  their  pleasant,  peaceful 


A  iSp&wVead,  f  ««}d  W)  ClRjbtuhjt  Coigopcp 


.^^TOOjO&n^taipJiwqitjtjsea . 


homes   on   the   uplands   and  the  wealth   of 
beasts  and  fodder  to  be  found  there,  and  the 


VFUCe»I.fw>cL 
/.urruodfyuo.Caivb 


-ABromt  CtttTC)ould.opw)iU)d.  cloSld; 
tout)d  aCt)iu>  £trKt,Catt)bTicUjc,i9C$. 


clean  shining  Irish  gold,  led  other  races,  the 
taller  round-headed  men  of  Central  Europe 


10  LIFE    IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

to  come  over  the  sea.  These  men  learnt  to  use 
weapons  of  bronze,  and  gradually  spread  over 
the  grasslands  of  the  east  and  midlands  and 
far  north-eastern  Scotland.1 

A  few  of  them  seem  to  have  reached  our 
district,  for  in  Barnwell  was  found  one  of  the 
pottery  vases  called  Beakers  which  they  made, 
and  a  few  of  their  bronze  celts  or  axes,  but  we 
don't  know  whether  they  settled  here.  They 
were  half-a-foot  taller  than  the  first  men,  and 
had  beetling  eyebrows  and  big  cheekbones. 

The   Iron  Age 

They  were  followed  by  wave  upon  wave  of 
races  from  Europe,  these  new-comers  too 
drawn  probably  by  the  wish  to  trade.  Of 
middle  height  and  beardless,  with  round 
bullet-heads,  they  seem  to  have  been  more 
ready  to  fight  than  the  rest,  or  perhaps  they 
had  more  cause,  as  each  fresh  group  filled  up 
the  open  grass  lands  and  had  to  live  nearer 
the  river  or  to  clear  away  some  of  the  forest. 
By  this  time  men  had  found  out  how  to  work 
iron  ore  into  tools  and  weapons,  and  had  to 

1  See  Crawford.  Geographical  Journal  (Aug.  and  Sept.,  1912). 


THE   GRASSLAND    STRIP  11 

build  strongholds  to  keep  their  families  and 
cattle  safe.  Tribe  after  tribe  pressed  into 
Britain  between  1200  B.C.  and  the  time  when 
Christ  was  born.  One  of  them  was  called 
Britons,  and  though  it  was  only  a  small  group 
it  gave  its  name  to  the  land.  Coming  from 
over  the  Channel  they  settled  in  the  south 
and  east,  a  strong  tribe  named  the  Iceni  taking 
the  land  between  the  Wash  and  the  sea.  Safe 
against  attack  on  either  side,  they  found  their 
only  danger  in  the  open  way  across  the  grass 
by  which  for  centuries  folk  had  come  north 
from  the  Downs  and  Thames  to  trade  and 
settle.  So  they  planted  a  settlement  at  our 
fords  of  the  river  and  along  the  gravel  ridge 
to  south  of  it,  higher  up,  too,  where  Grant- 
chester  now  is  they  passed  the  narrower 
streams.  But  others  could  do  so,  and  perhaps 
wrest  the  rich  grass  and  riverside  lands  from 
them.  How  should  they  secure  it  against  all 
comers  from  the  south  ?  On  the  chalk  hill 
tops  where  little  wood  could  grow  except  the 
beeches  they  built  big  camps,  digging  out  the 
soil  for  12  or  15  feet,  and  throwing  it  up  into  a 
great  encircling  mound  on  which  they  could 
plant  a  strong  fence  of  timber.     This  would 


12 


LIFE   IN   OLD   CAMBRIDGE 


do  well  to  hold  the  hill,  but  enemies  could 
still  pass  along  the  open  way  below  to  the  rich 
lands  of  Norfolk  and  Suffolk.  They  must 
bar  the  open  Ridgeway.  So  they  made  Dykes 
of  earth  such  as  fenced  their  camp-villages, 


iS&Lif  \>M^M 


^fe^feM^S 


^SSBpr 


•h=m 


y\)iT\zamT)yhe>,  Oarpbridggshtce . 


but  longer  and  mightier.  Like  the  men  of 
China  or  Babylon  they  would  build  a  great 
earth-wall  to  shut  the  open  entrance  to  the 
land  of  their  tribe.  From  in  under  the 
eastern  forest  of  oaks  and  beeches  on  the  hills 
it  should  run  out  into  the  open  where  wind 
and  sun  played  hide  and  seek  with  the  cloud- 
shadows  all  along  its  sides.     There  the  grass 


THE   GRASSLAND    STRIP  13 

grew  short  and  sweet  and  the  Dyke  ran  on 
and  on  down  the  slopes  to  where  the  water  of 
the  Fens  made  marching  impossible.  Right 
on  down  into  the  water  they  built  it  so  that 
there  was  no  room  to  pass  between  the  dyke 
and  the  marsh  at  one  end  of  the  dyke  and  the 
forest  thickets  at  the  other,  and  a  few  Britons 
on  the  dyke  could  challenge  all  comers  from 
the  south.  Two  such  great  Banks  and  ditches 
run  close  to  Cambridge,  the  Fleam  Dyke  from 
Balsham  to  Fen  Ditton  still  lies  like  a  great 
grass  swathe  across  the  way  to  Newmarket 
and  Brandon.  Not  one  or  two  only  were  the 
Dykes,  but  four.  North  of  it  lies  "  the 
Devil's  Dyke,"  and  to  the  south  two  more. 
An  invader  trying  to  come  in  along  the 
Way  would  first  have  had  to  force  the 
passage  of  the  Brand  Ditch,  running  from 
the  bogs  between  Melbourne  and  Fowl- 
mere  to  Heydon  on  the  hills  above  the 
Thames,  then  the  Brent  Ditch  near  Abing- 
ton  (then  that  of  the  so-called  Worsted 
Street),1  then  Fleam  Dyke,  and  at  last  the 
mighty  Devil's  Dyke,  a  massive  pile  30  feet 
high  from  the  bottom  of  the  Ditch  to  the  top 

x Probably  not  a  dyke;  the  old  name  ia  Wolf  Street  Way. 


14  LIFE    IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

of  the  mound  and  reaching  unbroken  for  10 
long  miles,  from  Reach  on  the  water  to  the 
forest  Wood  Ditton.1 

1See  Conybeare's  Cambridgeshire,  p.  14. 


Chapter  II. 

The   Romans 

In  the  Iceni's  time  the  great  Roman 
Empire,  under  those  Caesars  who  commanded 
that  "  all  the  world  should  be  taxed,"  had 
spread  northward  and  westward  from  Rome 


1.  "Frept  cf  ShUld.     a.  Riveras, fct^jutiN  b»<K»l». 
T»up*  tX,  CovTvfv  jv),  Dtas:  illy,  C*tt)&s,  mi». 

till  it  reached  the  English  Channel.  Across  the 
water  the  men  of  Gaul  had  been  fighting  hard 
for  their  freedom  with  Julius,  the  first  Caesar. 
They  sent  for  help  to  their  brothers  in  Britain. 


16  LIFE   IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

Reinforcements  slipped  over  from  the  island 
to  their  aid,  not  as  they  go  now,  to  France  in 
great  steam  transports,  but  in  tiny  wooden 
boats,  rigged  with  queer  sails  of  skin  or 
leather.  Caesar  himself  wrote  down  what 
they  were  like.1 

"  The  keels  somewhat  flatter  than  our  ships, 
so  that  they  can  take  the  shallows  more  easily 
at  ebb  tide ;  the  prows  and  the  sterns  too 
very  upright,  suited  to  the  great  waves  and 
storms.  The  ships  are  made  of  wood  through- 
out to  bear  strain  and  hard  use  to  the  utmost ; 
the  rowers  benches  fixed  with  iron  nails  as 
thick  as  my  thumb  to  beams  a  foot  wide  ; 
the  anchors  bound  with  chains  instead  of 
rope  ;  skins  for  sails,  the  leather  tanned  fine, 
either  because  they  have  no  linen  or  don't 
know  how  to  use  it,  or  more  likely  because 
they  have  to  bear  such  ocean  storms  and 
wind-storms  and  such  weight  of  ships  that 
they  do  not  think  it  handy  to  manage  with 
cloths." 

Wishing  to  see  their  land,  Caesar  gathered 
a  fleet  of  galleys  and  sailed  to  the  white  cliffs 
of  Kent.     Despite  resistance  he  marched  his 

1  Caesar  D.B.O.  iii,  Ships  of  the  Veneti  of  South  Brittany . 


THE   ROMANS  17 

legions  into  the  great  forests,  seizing  camp 
after  camp  on  the  hilltops  till  he  wrested  even 
St.  Albans  from  Caswallon,  King  of  certain 
of  the  British  tribes  in  the  Thames  district. 
After  this  Britain  was  very  loosely  linked  to 
Rome  for  a  hundred  years  till  Caswallon' s 
grandson,  Cymbeline,  made  East  Anglia  his 
own  :  his  coins  are  often  found  here.  But 
the  Iceni  hated  his  law,  and  later  helped  a 
Roman  army  to  defeat  his  son  Caradoc,  and 
make  Britain  into  a  Roman  province.1  The 
first  orders  the  new  subjects  got  were  to  lay 
down  their  arms  and  this  no  doubt  they  would 
have  done  but  the  fierce,  keen  Iceni,  who 
had  fought  shoulder  to  shoulder  with  the 
Romans  against  the  other  tribes,  expected 
better  treatment.  They  thought  themselves 
as  good  as  any  Romans,  and  rather  than  lay 
down  the  spears  and  swords  which  they  had 
carried  from  boyhood  they  defied  mighty 
Rome,  the  world-wide  Empire,  and  called 
the  other  tribes  to  help  them  to  turn  out  the 
foreigners.  They  re-built  the  Dykes  ;  strong 
fences  of  timber  were  no  doubt  reared  along 
their  crests  and  all  the  manhood  of  the  tribes 

1  Gardiner.     Students  History  oj  England.     Vol.  I,  p.  2. 


18 


LIFE    IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 


gathered    behind    them    to  withstand    the 
enemy. 

If  we  try  to  imagine  what  followed  we  may 
guess  that  the  Roman  forces,  led  by  Ostorius 
Scapula,  would  march  north  from  Ermine 
Street  along  the  Icknield  Way.  Perhaps  they 
crossed  the  Cam  at  Shelf ord  and  rested  for  the 
night  in  the  grass  at  Granhams,  where  you 
may  still  trace  three  sides  of  a  simple  Roman 
Camp.  On  the  Gogs,  just  above  them,  would 
frown  the  hill  camp  of  the  Iceni.  Next  morn- 
ing no  doubt  the  Roman  trumpets  blew  to 
the  attack,  and  Scapula  led 
his  soldiers  out.  Steadily 
climbing  the  long  easy  slopes 
they  kept  their  ranks  and 
poured  over  the  earthworks 
of  Vandlebury.  But  the  main 
resistance  had  been  prepared 
at  the  Fleam  Dyke.  Crowded 
together  on  the  Dyke  the 
Sww,  fipSSwSj.  Britons  would  look  out  eagerly, 
only  to  see  stragglers  fleeing 
to  them  and  the  enemy  following  swift 
behind.  Like  a  steel  wall  the  Roman  legions 
would  march  up,  shield  locked  in  shield,  and 


THE   ROMANS  19 

the  rough  arrows  and  spears  of  the  natives  rain 
down  harmlessly  for  the  most  part  on  their 
solid  front.  Pierced  by  their  javelins,  smitten 
down  by  their  short,  keen  swords,  the  Britons 
soon  broke  and  fled  out  over  the  long  nine 
miles  to  the  Devil's  Dyke.  As  when  a  great 
sea-dyke  bursts  the  waves  pour  through  and 
spread  along  the  plain,  so  men  fleet-footed 
raced  the  ponies  of  their  leaders  for  the  last 
shelter.  The  great  thirty-foot  Devil's  Dyke, 
crowning  the  long  climb  to  the  moor  looked 
indeed  immovably  safe,  no  doubt,  for  those 
who  could  slip  in  behind  it ;  but  the  one 
entrance  was  soon  blocked,  and  then  the 
fugitives  crowding  on  one  another  could  not 
even  turn  to  defend  themselves.  The  Romans 
coming  hard  after  them  found  them  as  easy 
prey  as  a  flock  of  sheep,  penned  for  the  shear- 
ing. They  did  not  spare  ;  when  evening  fell 
hardly  any  of  the  Iceni  was  left  alive  and 
the  rest  were  slaves. 

Caradoc  indeed  escaped  the  slaughter,  hav- 
ing earlier  been  driven  away  into  the  fast- 
nesses of  Wales  to  raise  what  help  he  could, 
but  the  next  year  the  Romans  had  followed 


20  LIFE    IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

him  even  there  and  shattered  the  last  hope  of 
freedom.1 

The  Roman  rule  was  harsh.  Roman  money- 
makers bullied  and  robbed  the  Britons  for 
12  weary  years  till  a  last  outrage  against  the 
Queen  Boudica  brought  revolt.  The  savagery 
of  its  short-lived  success  led  to  fearful  revenge 
when  Rome  once  more  got  the  upper  hand, 
and  the  men  of  Cambridgeshire,  who  had 
led  the  revolt,  were  wiped  out.  The  Romans 
drove  straight  stone-paved  roads  through  the 
land  from  camp  to  camp  ;  held  fortresses  at 
Colchester,  at  Godmanchester,  at  Chesterford 
and  in  Cambridge  itself,  which  held  down  the 
feeble  remnants  of  the  warlike  tribes  till  they 
grew  quieter  and  learned  the  arts  and  civil 
ways  of  their  rulers. 

1  For  the  sake  of  the  story  I  have  followed  Conybeare,  p.  19. 


Chapter  III. 
The   Province 

When  the  Romans  were  masters  of  the  land 
they  used  many  of  the  old  British  hilltop 
forts  as  camps  or  outposts  and  built  others  of 
their  own  fashion.  The  coasts  were  guarded 
by  Roman  galleys  and  by  camps,  such  as 
Caistor  and  Brancaster,  and  all  the  eastern 
coast  was  under  the  rule  of  a  Roman  called 
"  The  Count  of  the  Saxon  Shore"  (a  name  the 
later  story  will  explain).  Each  camp  was 
square  in  shape  with  gates  North,  South, 
East,  and  West,  from  which  the  great  roads 
ran,  so  that  Britain  was  covered  with  a  stone 
network  of  military  roads  in  which  the  knots 
were  stone  cities,  each  one  built  about  an 
open  market-place  or  "  Forum."  The  old 
earthen  walls  were  faced  with  squared  blocks 
of  stone  and  each  gateway  was  defended  by  a 
stone  turret.  Safe  inside  the  Chester  gates 
Roman  nobles  built  beautiful  "  Villas,"  baths 
and  temples  ;  and  even  in  our  days  men  often 
find  10  or  12  feet  underground  remains  of  the 
altars  they  set  up  to  their  gods,  the  pottery 
they  made  or  brought  from  Gaul  or  the  coins, 


22  LIFE   IN   OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

stamped  with  their  Caesars'  names.  Near 
the  old  fords  fine  bridges  of  timber  or  stone 
carried  the  new  roads. 

At  Cambridge  the  hillside  on  the  west  of 
the  ford  became  a  great  oblong  Chester,  2,500 
feet  from  East  to  West,  and  2,000  feet  from 
North  to  South,  its  walls  ran  from  Chesterton 
Lane,  round  the  site  of  St.  Giles'  and  the  top 
of  the  hill,  where  now  St.  Peter's  stands,1 
down  again  to  Merton  Hall  garden.  From  the 
Forum,  no  doubt  a  Roman  Governor  could 
look  out  over  the  whole  land,  see  the  distant 
trees  that  grew  on  the  Isle  of  Ely,  standing 
among  the  northern  waters,  watch  the  street 
that  climbed  away  north-west  to  Godman- 
chester,  or  turning  scan  the  height  of  Vandle- 
bury  camp  for  the  glitter  of  the  sentinel's 
signal.  To  the  south  as  the  Roman  Peace 
grew  villas  began  to  rise  on  the  pleasant, 
sunny  slopes  over  which  Ermine  Street  ran, 
making  for  Londinium  and  the  galleys  that 
sail  for  Rome.  As  their  builders  cut  down 
the  forest  above  and  drained  the  marshes 
below  troops  of  slaves  went  out  from  every 

1  For  inconclusiye  evidence  of  a  temple  to  Diana  on  this  site 
eee  The  Cambridge  Portfolio,  p.  264: 


THE  PROVINCE  23 

villa  to  plough  and  tend  the  soil,  and  for  the 
first  time  the  Cambridge  lands  began  to  shine 
with  waving  fields  of  wheat  and  oats  and 
barley.  Vineyards  too  they  may  have  made 
facing  the  sun  as  in  their  own  Italy,  rows  of 
short  creepers  forming  glistening  patches  of 
green  among  the  cornfields,  but  above  all  were 
great  herds  of  sheep,  driven  out  to  crop  the 
sweet  grass  and  thyme  of  the  hillsides  and 
carefully  guarded  at  night  from  the  forest 
wolves.  Beside  each  villa  the  slaves  quarters 
or  "  ergastula "  formed  the  black  heart 
of  the  domain,  where  men  of  Africa,  or  Asia, 
or  rude  tribesmen  caught  in  the  woods  of 
Germania  or  Helvetia  bowed  under  the  whip 
of  the  freedman  who  farmed  the  land  for 
his  master.  In  the  forum  of  Cambridge, 
as  in  other  cities,  no  doubt  men  and  women 
with  their  children  could  be  seen  put  up  for 
sale.  Here  perhaps  a  learned  Greek,  whose 
master  had  tired  of  study,  would  fetch  a  big 
price ;  there  a  Walloon  captured  in  the 
Flemish  marshes  would  be  advertised  as  a 
skilled  boatman,  likely  to  be  useful  in  the 
Fens  ;  here  again  a  shivering  Egyptian  or 
Arab  would  be  bought  to  act  as  stoker  in  the 


*How)ai)Vlssctt69Ut)dar  Lea(Ui)V)ali;SCrcet,t,OT)cUw. 


— — — — —  !■—  — — —  mini   i  mini  — inm—  i— muTOTinwi      nr      ■ 


THE   PROVINCE 


25 


villa  "  hypocaust."  Native  cattle,  still  half 
wild,  would  be  driven  in  from  the  eastern 
grazing  grounds,  hustling  one  another  in  fear 
over  the  strange  white  bridge1,  to  mingle  with 
oxen  shipped  hither  from  Italy  and  Gaul : 
the  rough,  short,  dun  ponies  from  the  Berk- 
shire downs  would  be  squealing  and  biting 


1.  goiparjBrotfttpbu&fotwdujC^ 

at  the  glossy,  desert-bred  Roman  chariot 
horses  as  they  drank  together  at  the  aquaduct. 
Below  on  the  river  the  bluff-bowed  galleys 
would  lie  loading  up  with  grain  for  Caesar's 
soldiers  in  Germania,  while  the  red  ware  made 
of  Terra  Sigillata  they  had  brought,  signed 
with  (Cistio  Titi)  the  Flemish  maker's  mark,  lay 

1  No  remains  of  a  stone  bridge  have  been  found,  but  a9  a 
centre  of  roads  it  seems  probable  that  Cambridge  would  have 
had  one. 


26  LIFE    IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

heaped  upon  the  straw  on  the  wharf.  Soon 
it  would  be  shown  in  the  dealer's  booth  and 
carried  to  the  purchaser's  villa  at  Foxton  or 
Cottenham  or  out  across  the  hills  to  Colchester. 
You  may  see  pieces  of  them  still,  and  trace 
the  maker's  name  if  you  ask  in  the  Archseo- 
logical  Museum.  When  you  handle  them 
try  to  picture  the  Cambridge  of  those  days, 
the  stately  Roman  in  his  bordered  toga 
entering  the  temple  to  pour  a  goblet  of  wine  to 
the  gods  ;  the  gay  young  centurion  wheeling 
his  century  in  the  Forum  changed  the  guard 
at  the  Praetorium ;  the  farmer  citizens  from 
the  country  villas  each  followed  by  his  steward 
and  a  troop  of  slaves,  meeting  to  pay  their 
tithes  to  the  decurion,  to  hear  the  news  from 
Rome,  and  enjoy  an  hour's  gossip  in  the  baths. 
The  fortunate  Briton  who  had  made  friends 
with  the  Romans  and  secured  his  freedom, 
dressed  now  in  a  toga,  aping  Roman  manners. 
He  stands  to  listen  perhaps  to  a  preacher  of 
the  strange  new  Christian  creed  and  laughs  as 
his  Roman  friend  declares  it  is  only  another 
of  the  Eastern  sects  that  have  been  turning 
the  world  upside  down  and  should  be  left  to 
slaves  and  women. 


THE   PROVINCE  27 

For  while  the  Romans  had  been  settling 
their  new  province  of  Britain  strange  things 
had  happened  in  Rome. 

One  day  about  the  time  that  Scapula 
subdued  the  Iceni  a  troop  of  men  walked  out 
from  among  the  great  marble  palaces  and 
temples  of  Rome  along  the  old  south  road, 
the  Via  Appia.  They  were  very  plainly  clad, 
quiet  but  confident  in  bearing  and  talked  with 
great  eagerness  as  they  hastened  along. 
When  they  had  reached  a  halting  place  where 
three  taverns  stood,  they  seated  themselves 
under  the  shade  of  an  olive  tree,  but  one 
young  man  went  on  down  the  road  and  stood 
looking  southwards.  Presently  he  waved  his 
hand,  and  they  sprang  up  to  greet  a  little 
group  of  men  coming  towards  them  led  by 
one  small  of  stature  and  roughly  clad  but 
bearing  himself  like  a  victorious  general. 
When  he  reached  them  he  raised  his  hand  in 
blessing,  and  they  all  bowed  their  heads,  then 
broke  into  a  joyous  chant.  It  was  St.  Paul, 
and  the  Roman  Christians  were  doubly  over- 
joyed when  they  heard  of  his  escape  from 
shipwreck  and  thought  of  the  teaching  he 
would  give  them  in  the  coming  days.     As  a 


28  LIFE   IN   OLD   CAMBRIDGE 

prisoner  awaiting  trial  he  would  be  kept 
in  Rome,  and  they  could  care  for  him  and 
learn  from  his  lips  the  story  of  his  conversion 
and  the  work  he  had  done  among  the  Greeks. 
During  all  the  three  hundred  years  that  Rome 
held  Britain  St.  Paul's  disciples  learnt  and 
practised  the  new  faith.  Sometimes  they 
were  left  in  peace  to  worship  quietly,  and  then 
Nero  or  Domitian  would  take  a  fancy  to  root 
out  the  religion  which  made  even  slaves  inde- 
pendent and  defiant  of  their  orders.  Then 
the  Christians  would  hide  in  underground 
burial-places  to  hold  their  services  or  flee  into 
waste  places,  but  their  best  were  taken  and 
brought  into  the  arena  to  fight  with  African 
lions  or  wild  boars  from  the  Apennines,  while 
the  city-bred  Romans  sat  on  the  marble  tiers 
of  seats  in  the  great  theatre  and  cheered  or 
hissed  as  the  sight  aroused  their  passions. 
But  "  the  blood  of  martyrs  is  the  seed  of  the 
Church  "  :  men  were  moved  by  the  sight  of 
these  heroic  sufferers  and  asked  what  it  was 
that  made  them  go  singing  to  their  awful 
deaths.  Many  more  became  Christians,  and 
even  among  the  settlers  in  Britain  the  faith 
spread.    The  symbol  of  the  cross  was  raised 


THE   PROVINCE  29 

over  stones  that  had  been  pagan  altars  and 
temples  were  turned  into  churches.  At  last 
in  321  a.d.  the  Emperor  Constantine  gave 
leave  to  all  his  subjects  openly  to  worship 
Christ,  so  throughout  Britain  the  church 
spread,  bishops  ruled  great  districts,  and 
helped  the   praefects   in  the   cities. 

Where  Castle  Hill  stands  all  these  things 
happened  day  by  day  for  three  hundred  years 
and  more  till  Britons  forgot  they  had  ever  been 
free  and  ignorant  or  had  to  fight  for  fife  against 
the  wild  beasts  or  among  themselves.  But 
the  prosperous,  peaceful  life  began  to  be  dis- 
turbed by  rumours  of  trouble  in  Rome.  The 
Emperors  had  left  the  city.  The  Goths  were 
threatening  the  new  capital,  Constantinople, 
then  Italy,  at  last  even  Rome  itself,  and 
sacked  it  in  410  a.d.  The  Roman  troops 
were  recalled  to  Italy.  Cohort  after  cohort 
must  have  marched  into  Chesterton  from 
the  North  ;  some  came  down  Watling  Street 
from  Chester  and  the  Welsh  Marches  ;  others 
from  the  great  North  Wall  through  Eboracum 
(York)  and  down  the  Ermine  Street  or  by  the 
Akeman  Street  from  the  Coast,  where  the  Count 
of  the  Saxon  shore  held  watch  and  ward  against 


30  LIFE   IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

those  pirates  of  the  Wide  Sea.  Into  the 
camp  on  Castle  Hill  they  would  pour,  rest  a 
night  or  two,  and  then  march  out  by  the 
southern  gate  down  Akeman  Street  to  join 
the  road  for  London  or  to  pass  by  Silchester 
to  Venta  Belgarum  (Winchester)  and  take  ship 
for  Gaul  and  Italy,  for '  'all  roads  lead  to  Rome." 
Legion  after  legion  got  their  marching  orders, 
and  when  the  wealthy  farmers  asked  "  Who 
guards  the  Wall  ?  ':  "Is  there  no  fighting 
with  the  Picts  ?  "  centurion  or  legionary 
shook  his  head  and  muttered  grim  stories  of 
the  blocking  of  the  wide  gateways  that  guard 
the  camps  behind  the  great  North  Wall, 
and  how  a  dozen  men  were  left  to  guard  five 
miles  of  frontier  ;  how  empty  lay  the  great 
base  camps,  while  all  who  still  dared  live  upon 
the  border  drew  together  into  the  walled 
chesters  for  safety.  For  Home,  the  Eternal 
City,  was  falling  and  the  "  Pax  Romana," 
which  had  brooded  over  every  province,  even 
to  distant  Britain,  was  coming  to  an  end. 
Now  every  Roman  lord  and  British  farmer 
must  look  to  his  own  right  arm  to  shield  him 
and  his  villa. 


Chapter  IV. 

Saxon   Times  :    Pagan  and   Christian 
The  Desolation 

For  a  hundred  years  Cambridge  and  the  rest 
of  Britain  suffered  grievous  things.  As  the 
shining  legions  of  Rome  marched  away  south 
the  prosperous  Britons  and  Roman  settlers 
were  left  to  themselves.  British  chiefs  took 
up  the  title  of  King  and  issued  coins  stamped 
with  their  heads  as  the  Caesars  had  done ; 
they  are  found  now  sometimes,  little  hoards 
of  them  hidden  away  in  the  ground  in  an 
earthenware  jar  or  single  coins  dropped 
perhaps  in  hasty  flight  from  a  lonely  villa 
beset  and  burned  by  the  barbarians.  In  the 
cities  Decurions  and  Bishops  still  held  rule, 
and  tried  their  best  to  keep  up  the  walls  and 
to  rally  the  frightened  townsmen  in  their  own 
defence.  For  the  peaceable  farmers  and 
traders  found  it  hard  to  train  themselves  in 
the  strict,  military  discipline  which  had 
rendered  the  legions  such  a  power.  The 
Roman  habits  and  customs,  their  ways  of 


32  LIFE   IN   OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

building  and  farming  gradually  decayed,  and 
the    Christians    slipped    back    into    the    old 
heathen  practices,  sacrificing  furtively  to  the 
Sun  or  to  some  local  forest  god  in  the  wild  hill 
country.     The  great  Wall  in  the  north  was 
broken  down  and  overrun  ;    barbarous  Picts 
and   their   Irish   allies   swarmed  southwards 
and  reached  the  midlands,   plundering  and 
burning  the  cities  and  slaughtering  the  feeble 
households  of  the  farms  and  villas.     Bravely 
the  bishops  tried  to  rally  their  poor  terrified 
flocks,  going  out  before  them  with  the  Cross 
to  do  battle  and  themselves  fighting  manfully 
to  beat  back  the  raiders  as  they  did  at  the 
"  Hallelujah "    victory1.     They   appealed   in 
vain  for  help  to  the  Roman  Governor  in  Gaul, 
in  a  letter  called  "  The  Groans  of  the  Britons," 
saying,   "  The  barbarians  drive  us  into  the 
sea  ;  the  sea  drives  us  back  to  the  barbarians  '> 
between  them  we  are  exposed  to  two  sorts  of 
death ;     we   are   either   slain   or   drowned." 
Still  the  pagans  came  on.     The  story  of  St. 
Patrick  tells  how  they  ravaged  a  place  in 
North  Wales,  killed  the  Decurion  and  carried 
off  his  son,  little  Patrick,  to  be  a  slave  and  herd 

1  Bede  xx. 


SAXON  TIMES  33 

cattle  in  Ireland.  Such  things  were  happen- 
ing every  day  all  over  the  north  and  the  mid- 
lands. Men  shut  themselves  up  within  the 
four  walls  of  a  city  and  built  up  the  wide 
gateways  till  there  was  only  room  for  one  man 
at  a  time  to  pass  in  or  out.  Lonely  villas 
were  abandoned,  their  treasures  buried,  and 
soon  the  vineyards  and  cornfields  that  had 
made  Roman  Britain  one  of  the  great  gran- 
aries of  the  world  were  over-run  with  weeds 
and  brambles,  and  grass  began  to  grow  between 
the  stones  of  the  straight  Roman  roads  which 
had  knit  all  quarters  of  the  province  up  with 
Rome. 

At  last,  the  south  Britons  in  despair, 
watching  the  barbarians  draw  steadily  nearer 
to  their  last  refuge,  sent  to  the  Angles  and 
Saxons  of  the  Continent  for  help,  and  in  449 
a.d.  the  first  Englishmen  landed  in  Kent. 
It  was  at  Stamford  on  the  Welland  that  these 
new  allies  first  did  battle  against  the  Picts 
and  Scots,  and  no  doubt  the  men  of  Cambridge 
sent  a  body  of  swordsmen  to  join  them  as 
they  passed  along  the  Ermine  Street  to  the 
field  of  battle. 


34 


LIFE    IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 


The   English 


The  English  strangers  wore  sharp,  narrow 
blades,  which  they  called  "  seaxas."  One 
was  found  at  Barrington  in  1890,  and  is  now 
in  the  Archaeological  Museum.  It  is  an  iron 
dagger-blade,  12  inches  long  and  two  in 
breadth,  almost  straight,  but  pointed  and 
grooved.  There,  too,  are  bronze  and  gilded 
brooches  shaped  like  horses'  faces,  with  which 


Ande-j&xm  Zwxt ,  aud'BUl,  found  rt  TJttTtngfoti,  Cambridgeshire,  to  t8S3uidt887. 

they  fastened  their  plaids  at  the  shoulder  or 
neck,  and  the  round  bucklers  they  carried  on 
the  left  arm.  Those  were  made  of  wood  or 
leather  crossed  with  strips  of  iron  or  strength- 
ened by  great  iron  studs  and  bosses.  As 
they  marched  along  the  paved  street  and 
looked  out  on  the  green  pastures  and  shining 
waterways  of  Cambridge  and  Suffolk  the 
English  thought  how  easily  they  could  sail 


SAXON   TIMES 


35 


their  light  ships  up  into  the  heart  of  such  a 
land,  and  how  poor  a  fight  the  Britons  were 
likely  to  put  up.  So  when  they  had  beaten 
the  Picts  they  sent  home  for  their  kin,  who 
came  swarming  in  by  the  rivers  Ouse  and 
Yare  and  Thames. 


5ibuk, awfP&U: of  Ctasra ,  mitb decpralut ptak stX \yitb  silver  dlaes, 


Where  the  Britons  resisted  their  towns  were 
burnt,  and  they  themselves  enslaved  or  driven 
back  into  those  marsh  refuges  which  had 
sheltered  their  early  ancestors.  The  English 
would  not  live  cooped  up  in  towns,  but  set 
up  their  villages  in  the  open  country. 


36 


LIFE    IN   OLD    CAMBRIDGE 


Beside  the  fords  of  the  streams  by  which 
they  had  entered,  in  an  open  forest  glade  on 
the  hillside,  or  on  the  sunny  uplands  from 
which  they  could  overlook  all  the  valleys,  they 
reared  their  wooden  huts  and  barns.     Cutting 


down  beeches  or  oaks  to  form  upright  "  crucks 
or  crutches,"  they  set  them  15  feet  apart 
like  the  pillars  of  a  church.  A  long  straight 
trunk  with  the  bark  on,  placed  from  one 
pair  of  crutches  to  another,  formed  the 
roof-tree,  stout  timber  beams  the  rafters, 
and  between  the  uprights  hurdle-work  of 
wattle  daubed  with  straw-bound  clay  filled 


SAXON    TIMES  37 

in  the  gaps  and  soon  dried  hard.  Then  thatch 
was  laid  on  the  rafters  from  the  well-cut  gable 
of  the  roof-tree  to  the  overhanging  eaves, 
often  no  more  than  five  or  six  feet  from  the 
ground,  as  you  may  see  them  still  in  parts  of 
Germany.  The  daub  was  washed  with  blue 
or  pink  or  yellow,  and  the  pathway  paved 
with  rounded  flints.  While  each  man  had  his 
own  cottage  nestling  in  its  toft  or  garden- 
patch  apart  from  its  neighbours,  big  barns 
and  stables  held  the  corn  and  cattle  of  the 
whole  kin  or  patriarchal  family  group1. 

Such  English  villages  would  spring  up  in 
Norfolk  and  Suffolk  as  the  Angles  worked 
their  way  inland  and  southward  to  our  own 
district ;  also  in  the  midlands  where  Mercians 
turned  east  till  they  reached  the  Cam.  Each 
village  had  its  cluster  of  huts,  its  warm 
meadow  for  the  lambs  and  kine,  its  bit  of 
plough-land  and  its  rough  pasture  on  the 
edge  of  moor  or  woodland.  Beyond  all  the 
land  of  the  tribe  was  the  protecting  "  mark  " 
or  boundary,  an  earthen  mound  with  quickset 


1  This  seems  to  be  implied  in  Rectitudines  Singularum 
Personarum,  see  Bland,  Brown  and  Tawney,  Select  Docts.  of 
Econ.  Hist. 


38  LIFE   IN   OLD   CAMBRIDGE 

hedge  or  timber  fence  and  a  cleared  belt 
beyond  it.  In  outlying  parts  the  villages 
still  stand  much  as  they  did  then,  a  cluster 
of  human  nests,  thatched  and  coloured, 
gathered  round  an  open  green,  but  dominated 
now  by  church  and  manor,  where  then  only 
the  village  moot,  the  mound  or  tree  of  public 
assembly,  marked  the  centre  of  the  village  life.1 
For  these  English  were  pagans,  worshipping 
Thor  and  Woden,  singing  the  old  sagas  and 
keeping  the  fierce  old  customs  of  "an  eye  for 
an  eye,"  as  their  notion  of  justice.  Horrid, 
ruthless  and  accursed  in  the  eyes  of  the 
Christian  Britons,  so  that  none  would  even  try 
to  convert  them,  superstitious  as  they  were 
ignorant,  they  looked  with  awe  and  dislike 
on  the  walled,  four-square  Roman  cities,  and 
left  them  to  moulder  away.  If  a  stone  bridge 
had  been  built  across  the  Cam  it  would  be 
let  fall  to  ruin  by  men  to  whom  ferries  and 
fords  were  more  natural.  The  villas  and 
streets  of  the  camps  collapsed  and  only  the 
names,  Chesterford,  Chesterton,  etc.,  showed 
they  had  once  existed  to  guard  the  crossings. 
For,  meeting  on  the  Cam  from  opposite  sides, 

1See  L.  Gomme.     Primitive  Folkmoots. 


SAXON  TIMES  39 

the  Mercians  and  Angles  became  bitter 
enemies.  While  Mercians  held  the  hill,  with 
a  strip  known  as  Aermeswerk,  south  of  the 
Roman  camp,  where  Magdalene  now  stands, 
the  Angles  held  the  gravel  ridge  on  the  east 
of  the  river  with  a  crossing  higher  up  at  Elde 
Newenham.  So  Cambridge  began  as  two 
towns,  the  northern  or  Mercian,  and  the 
southern  or  Anglian,  and  each  seems  to  have 
had  its  own  market  and  its  own  three  fields. 
The  south-eastern  fields  were  known  as  Barn- 
well Field,  and  reached  out  to  Ditton,  Cherry 
Hinton  and  Trumpington,  while  those  on  the 
north-west  were  called  Cambridge  Field,  and 
reached  from  Grantchester  round  to  Coton, 
Madingley,  Girton  and  Chesterton.  "  Each 
had  its  pieces  of  common  pasture.  Each  was 
apparently  cultivated  on  the  usual  three-field 
system.  The  three  divisions  of  Barnwell 
Field  were  known  as  Bradmore  Field,  Middle 
Field  and  Ford  Field.  .  .  .  Those  of  the 
western  or  Cambridge  Field  were  Grithow 
Field,  Middle  Field  and  Carme  Field,  with  the 
last  of  which  was  reckoned  Little  Field."1 

1  A.    Gray.      The   Dual   Origin   oj  the    Town  of  Cambridge, 
p.  2. 


T)otfyEoorujay  of  OurLdAy's  C^attd^tourbtld^. 


SAXON   TIMES  41 

Between  the  two  peoples,  Mercian  and 
Anglian  lay  the  Fens  and  in  them  a  remnant  of 
the  first  men  led  a  hunted  life.  Their  hand 
was  against  every  man,  and  the  fair-haired 
Saxons,  whom  they  ambushed  at  times  and 
robbed,  hated  their  dark,  southern  features,  and 
called  them  "Black  Devils"  and  "British 
Thieves."  To  the  eastward  of  their  haunts  the 
North  and  South  Folk  formed  the  notable 
kingdom  of  East  Anglia,  under  the  Uffing, 
Redwald.  At  the  court  of  his  neighbour. 
Ethelbert  of  Kent,  Redwald  had  met  the  monk 
from  Rome,  Augustine,  and  learned  to  worship 
Christ,  and  when  Ethelbert  died  it  was  Red- 
wald who  took  up  his  title  of  Bretwalda.  But 
Redwald  was  only  half  a  convert,  for  Bede 
tells  us  "in  the  same  temple  he  had  an  altar 
for  the  sacrifice  of  Christ,  and  another  small 
one  to  offer  victims  to  devils."  His  son,  too, 
was  first  heathen,  then  Christian,  and  for 
some  years  the  kingdom  was  torn  by  the 
conflict  between  the  old  savagery  and  the 
creed  of  Peace.  Redwald's  second  son,  Sige- 
bert,  was  driven  to  France,  and  there  learned 
from  the  Frankish  churchmen  to  love  the  new 
order. 


42  LIFE   IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

Coming  back  to  reign,  he  was  followed  by  St. 
Felix  of  Burgundy,  who  was  made  the  first 
bishop  of  East  Anglia.  With  his  help  Sigebert, 
"  being  desirous  to  imitate  the  good  institutions 
which  he  had  seen  in  France,  set  up  a  school 
for  boys  to  be  taught  in  Letters."1  Felix, 
no  doubt,  tried  to  convert  British  as  well  as 
Anglians,  for  he  died  at  Soham,  then  a  sea- 
port, looking  over  the  watery  haunts  of  the 
Girvii,  and  there  a  monastery  was  built  in 
his  honour.  Sigebert  was  an  ardent  servant 
of  Christ,  and  when  he  had  brought  order  and 
the  new  light  of  education  into  his  kingdom 
he  retired  into  a  monastery  hoping  to  end  his 
days  in  peace.  But  he  could  not  be  spared. 
The  Mercians  had  remained  pagans,  they 
made  a  raid  across  the  Cam,  and  Sigebert 
came  out  from  the  peaceful  cloister  to  stand 
by  his  people.  Carrying  no  weapon  but  a 
stick,  he  helped  his  successor  to  rally  them, 
and  a  stand  was  made,  but  in  the  fight  both 
leaders  were  slain,  and  yet  another  of  Red- 
wald's  descendants,  Anna,  became  king.  To 
confront  the  Mercian  danger  he  chose  as  his 

1  Conybeare's  Cambridgeshire  p.  45. 


SAXON   TIMES  43 

homestead,  Exiling,  a  village  lying  on  the 
western  slopes  of  the  downs,  backed  by  the 
heath  now  called  Newmarket,  and  over- 
looking the  lines  of  the  great  Dykes  that  still 
formed  the  best  barrier  of  defence  to  all  East 
Anglia  and  were  the  scenes  of  many  more 
great  battles. 

From  Exning  Anna  ruled  with  sword  and 
cross,  "  a  good  man  and  the  father  of  an  ex- 
cellent family,"  but  he  too  fell  at  last  before 
the  ceaseless  onslaughts  of  the  Mercians. 
They  were  the  only  pagans  left  in  England, 
and  the  more  furious  on  behalf  of  Woden  and 
Thor.  Their  king  Penda  attacked  one  Chris- 
tian king  after  another  till  he  was  supreme 
in  the  land.  In  654  came  the  turn  of  East 
Anglia,  and  Anna,  calling  to  his  aid  his  son- 
in-law,  Tonbert,  lord  of  the  South  Girvii, 
maybe  manned  the  Dykes  with  mixed  troops 
of  "British  thieves"  and  Saxon  Christians.  No 
valour  availed  against  the  practised  war-lord, 
Penda.  He  hurled  his  hordes  over  the  defences 
"  like  a  wolf,  so  that  Anna  and  his  folk  were 
devoured  in  a  moment."  But  this  was  the 
night  "  darkest  before  the  dawn,"  and  next 
year  Penda  was  killed  at  Winwaed  by  an 


44  LIFE    IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

allied  force  of  the  Christian  kings,  and  Mercia 
itself  was  soon  forced  to  lay  down  the  old 
heathen  faith  and  join  the  rest  of  England  in 
the  church. 

Nowhere  did  Christian  light  shine  out  more 
brilliantly  than  in  our  Eastern  land.  Anna's 
"  excellent  family  "  were  like  stately  columns 
upholding  the  holy  church.  One  son,  Erken- 
wald,  was  bishop  in  the  old  Roman  city  of 
London,  guarding  the  Thames  and  the  church- 
men's route  to  Canterbury  and  Rome.  His 
sisters  ruled  as  abbesses  of  Barking  and  of 
Dereham,  while  two  more,  Sexburga  and 
Ermenilda  queened  it  in  Kent  and  Mercia,  the 
one  carrying  on  the  work  of  St.  Augustine,  the 
other  strengthening  the  hands  of  St.  Chad  in 
his  stern  schooling  of  the  Mercians.  In  France 
another  sister,  Sedrida,  Abbess  of  Brie,  set 
up  schools  to  which  many  English  girls  went. 
Best  known  to  us  is  the  last  of  them  all,  St. 
Etheldreda.  Married  first  to  Tonbert,  she 
received  as  dowry  the  fen-land  of  Ely,  and  on 
his  death  she  became  Queen  of  Northumbria. 
There  at  Whitby  her  aunt,  St.  Hilda,  had 
founded  a  famous  abbey,  and  was  diligent 
in  reviving  Christianity,  ravaged  by  Penda 


SAXON   TIMES  45 

Fired  by  her  teaching,  St.  Etheldreda  returned 
to  build  at  Ely  a  house1,  which  became  the 
beacon-light  of  the  fen-lands,  a  sanctuary  and 
refuge  for  the  oppressed  through  many  cen- 
turies, and  remains  to-day  one  of  the  most 
lovely  works  of  man. 

At  this  time  began  to  rise  in  Cambridge- 
shire and  the  surrounding  country  a  ring 
of  abbeys,  centres  both  of  religious  scholar- 
ship and  of  wise  farming  lore,  which  gave 
this  country-side  a  foremost  place  in 
English  history.  Ely,  Peterborough,  Thorney, 
Ramsey,  and  Crowland  were  the  most 
famous.  The  intercourse  which  would  grow 
between  Ely  and  Brie  is  typical  of  the 
close  contact  of  East  Anglia  with  the  most 
flourishing  ports  of  France  and  Flanders  for 
the  next  thousand  years.  The  great  water- 
way of  the  Fens  and  Wash  was  one  with  that  of 
the  North  Sea,  the  Scheldt  and  Rhine.  From 
650  a.d.  onwards  the  growing  trade  of  the 
Frank  and  Flemish  cities  would  supply  the 
great,  monastic  houses  of  East  Anglia.  Costly 
embroideries,  rich  jewelled  relics,  gorgeously- 
bound  books,  spices  and  incense  for  the  abbey 

1  Bede,  chap.  xix.  and  xx. 


46 


LIFE    IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 


churches  came  over  the  Alps  and  down  the 
Rhine  stream  from  the  Levant  merchants, 
and  so  across  the  "  Wide  Sea,"  to  be  landed  at 
Ely  or  Soham  or  Bottisham,  or  further  up  the 


jfj'ixon "Food. Vessel.  >ountLaIiiarru)gTon. in 
C&nfortdqcsforc,  in  i  ss  o . 


Jpwonwuo  Vessels,  Pound  at  Hars&ro.CSarobs-. 

inland  water  to  Landbeach  or  the  wharves  of 
Cambridge  itself.  There  the  Irish  boats  too 
came  in,  their  dark,  Celtic  boatmen  wrapped 


SAXON  TIMES  47 

in  heavy  frieze  cloaks  and  their  monks  bearing 
exquisitely  decorated  missals1,  richly  enamelled 
ornaments  and  weapons  and  wonderful  carved 
work  to  sell  to  their  brethren  of  the  South. 

For  Ireland  was  the  land  of  gold,  of  fine  art 
and  most  zealous  devotion,  the  centre  of 
learning  and  of  the  Faith.  For  four  cen- 
turies it  was  from  the  green  island  of  the 
western  seas  that  the  greatest  missionaries 
and  scholars  went  out  to  teach  Christ  to 
the  barbarous  Teuton,  not  in  Britain  only, 
but  in  Saxony,  Flanders  and  Germany,  till 
the  days  of  Charlemagne.  In  Scotland  and 
Wales  their  abbeys  stood  at  Iona,  at  Bardsey, 
and  at  Lindisfarne,  and  all  round  the  northern 
coasts  their  little  ships  plied  fearlessly.  Ely  and 
her  sister  abbeys  of  Peterborough  and  Crowland 
were  well-placed  to  receive  and  rest  these 
ardent  venturers  for  Christ  and  forward  them 
on  their  dangerous  missions  over  the  North 
Sea.  For  their  delicate  and  lovely  goods  the 
Anglians  would  give  quantities  of  their  rough 
pottery  and  strong  basket-ware  of  the  Fens, 

1  A  fragment  of  St.  Luke's  Gospel  in  Corpus  Christi  Library 
is  of  Seventh  Century  Irish  workmanship.  The  initial  letters 
are  most  beautifully  coloured  and  decorated  with  figures  of 
birds  intertwined  into  a  plaited  pattern 


48  LIFE  IN   OLD   CAMBRIDGE 

and  store  their  ships  afresh  with  fish  and  meat 
and  corn  from  the  abbey  lands.  So  they 
would  pass  on  to  be  the  founders  of  the  first 
bishoprics  in  Germany. 

From  a.d.  673  to  679  St.  Etheldreda  ruled 
in  Ely  and  over  the  300  square  miles  of  half- 
submerged  lands  known  as  the  Isle.  Men  of 
many  races  came  to  kneel  at  the  shrine  and  to 
traffic,  and  so  at  a  later  time  a  fair  sprang  up. 
This  went  on  year  after  year  until  in  Norman 
days  King  Henry  I.  ordered  all  boats  to 
go  to  Cambridge  to  unload,  and  then  no 
doubt  only  the  lighter  trifles  were  carried  to 
Ely,  to  St.  Audrey's  fair,  and  her  name 
became  the  word  for  worthless,  "  tawdry  " 
baubles. 

But  one  solid  relic  of  St.  Audrey's  reign 
remains,  the  stone  base  of  a  cross  kept  in 
Ely  Cathedral.     These  words  are  cut  upon 
it:— 
"  Lord,  give  Thy  light  and  peace  to  Owen.    Amen." 

Till  recently  it  stood  in  Haddenham. 
This  Owen  was  St.  Audrey's  prime  minister 
or  Over-Alderman.  His  name  is  a  British 
one  and  no  doubt  he  ruled  her  Girvian 
people    in    the    Fens.     He    lived,    perhaps, 


SAXON  TIMES  49 

at  Winford,  and  died  in  a  monastery 
at  Lichfield.  Bede  says  "  He  fully  forsook 
the  things  of  this  world,  quitting  all  that  he 
had,  clad  in  a  plain  garment  and  carrying 
an  axe  and  hatchet  in  his  hand,  .  .  .  signi- 
fying that  he  did  not  enter  the  monastery  to 
live  idle,  as  some  do,  but  to  labour."1  Such 
men  in  every  abbey  taught  the  Anglians  to 
forsake  war  and  roystering  and  to  use  the 
axe  against  their  natural  enemies  of  forest 
and  fen,  to  labour  and  learn  to  turn  the  wild 
country  into  fertile  farms. 

No  part  of  England  was  more  productive 
and  well  to  do  than  Cambridgeshire.  The 
lands  which  the  Romans  had  farmed  were 
easy  to  clear  and  cultivate  ;  the  great  abbeys 
followed  the  rules  of  the  Benedictine  houses 
abroad  and  their  stewards  organised  great 
troops  of  peasants  working  on  the  level  lands, 
growing  corn  and  wine  and  herding  sheep 
and  pigs.  Children  were  gathered  to  the 
monastery  schools  and  taught  useful  crafts 
and  trained  in  obedient  diligence  and  rever- 
ence for  holy  men  and  things.  Pilgrims  and 
travellers  passed  along  the  ancient  Way  and 

xSee  Conybeare,  p.  54. 


50  L1IE  IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

the  Roman  streets,  slept  at  the  abbey  guest- 
house, marvelled  at  the  rare  glass  windows 
of  the  churches,  and  told  thrilling  tales  of 
adventure  and  miracle  in  return  for  the  plenti- 
ful fare  and  home-made  wine  or  ale  of  the 
religious  hospices.  The  old  Pilgrims'  Way 
that  winds  over  the  hills  from  Walsingham 
to  Bury  and  on  through  Ickenham  still  shows 
where  the  troops  of  travellers,  pilgrims, 
merchants  and  soldiers  passed.  South-west 
beyond  Cambridge  St.  Mary's  chapel  crowned 
and  gave  its  name  to  the  first  line  of  hills  as 
a  landmark  to  guide  the  wayfarers  towards 
the    Ermine  Street. 

Now  after  Anna's  day  there  was  one  ruler 
for  all  the  kin  of  the  English,  Egbert  of 
Wessex,  and  the  men  of  Cambridge  and  East 
Anglia  came  in  to  him  and  had  help  of  him 
against  the  men  of  Mercia  in  825  a.d.  Freed 
from  that  danger  Cambridge  began  to  grow. 
Each  people  had  their  own  town  and  market- 
place, the  Mercians  on  the  fortified  hillside,  the 
Anglians  on  the  patches  of  dry  ground  known 
as  "  hills  "  amid  the  marsh  of  the  Eastern 
side.  The  gravel  ridge,  a  mile  or  so  wide, 
that  runs  from  the  Gogs  to  Magdalene  Bridge, 


SAXON  TIMES  51 

was  their  main  roadway,  with  houses  on 
either  side,  then  on  Market  Hill,  Peas  Hill  and 
St.  Andrew's  Hill,  three  more  clusters  of  huts 
soon  ran  into  one  town,  while  all  around  open 
marshy  fields  gave  pasture  and  ploughland 
as  far  as  Trumpington,  Hint  on  and  Ditton 
villages.  The  many  ancient  roads  meeting 
at  the  ford  brought  traffic  from  the  abbeys 
to  meet  the  merchants  riding  up  from  London 
and  the  ships  that  unloaded  at  Magdalene 
Wharf,  so  Egbert  gave  the  town  the  right  to 
have  a  mint  and  make  coins  stamped  with  his 
device. 
No  doubt  Cambridge  like  other  villages 
had  its  Reeve  and  four  good 
men  to  represent  it,  chosen  by 
cUwsja  the  Folkmoot ;  it  is  certain  that 
the  Hundred  Moot  was  held 
here,  which  met  at  first  by  the  Bridge.1 

Try  to  picture  the  Saxon  place  with  its 
groups  of  tiny  cottages,  built  of  timber  and 
hurdle-work  daubed  with  mud,  and  thatched 
with  straw  or  reeds.  Here  or  there  larger 
buildings,  made  of  the  same  simple  local 
means,   are  the  common  barns   or  may  be 

1  See  Liber  Eliensis,  p.  13o. 


52  LIFE   IN   OLD   CAMBRIDGE 

known  by  the  wooden  cross  or  bell-turret 
for  churches,  and  round  them  every  day  you 
may  see  monks  dressed  like  the  Italian  peasants 
in  rough  woollen  cloaks  and  hoods  going  in  and 
out,  building  a  new  house  for  themselves  or  a 
hospice  for  travellers,  showing  some  peasant 


1.  Anglo  -Saxoi)  ^piQdLt^ot^lromBarr^gtbn^Car^bs. 
a  .£axoT)  wovt^tr^ato^.enUcgcd/oiu^ui  CawidgC'. 

from  the  hills  how  to  fashion  a  plough  or  yoke, 
teaching  the  children  to  repeat  their  prayers, 
or  two  townsfolk  how  to  calculate  the  value 
of  the  goods  they  would  barter.  On  Sundays 
and  feast-days  the  people  flock  to  common 
worship.  Many  come  long  distances  out  of 
the  fens,   bringing  with  them  the  pots   or 


SAXON  TIMES  53 

baskets  they  have  made  since  the  last  feast, 
others  come  down  from  the  hills  with  skins 
of  wolves  or  wild-cats.  After  church  they 
stand  about  offering  these  things  in  exchange 
for  the  salt  some  seaman  has  brought  in  or 
the  flax  the  monks  have  been  growing.  So 
the  churchyards  become  the  market  places, 
and  men  who  live  in  the  outlying  hamlets 
look  to  Sunday  as  the  one  day  of  the  week 
in  which  they  can  leave  their  labour  of  dyking 
or  clearing  the  forest  and  meet  their  fellows, 
see  the  alderman  presiding  in  the  Moot  to 
settle  the  last  quarrel  with  the  Mercians  or 
bring  their  share  of  wheat  or  swine  to  pay 
tithe  and  house-penny  as  a  freeman  should. 

All  round  the  town  the  land  lies  open,  with- 
out hedges  or  trees  or  houses.  Some  of  it  is 
being  ploughed;  by  the  many  winding  branches 
of  the  river  are  meadows  of  lush  grass  ;  further 
off  in  the  plough-land  ponies  and  small 
cattle  are  being  kept  together  by  a  herd  while 
they  graze  the  rough  grass  and  weedy  stubble 
of  the  last  year's  harvest  field.  Away  on  the 
slopes  of  the  hills  herds  of  half  wild  pigs  are 
rooting  and  munching  under  the  trees  and 
filling  themselves  with  acorns  and  beechnuts. 


54  LIFE   IN   OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

Here  and  there  a  rough  sledge  or  cart  with 
solid  wooden  wheels  bumps  and  rumbles  along 
the  old  Roman  street  or  makes  its  heavy  way 
along  some  field  track  or  "  headland "  to 
where  the  "  hayward "  guides  a  line  of 
mowers.  A  few  old  thorn  bushes  give  patches 
of  shade  where  children  roll  and  play  in  the 
short,  trodden  grass  of  the  "  balk "  while 
their  parents  work  at  the  crops,  each  on  his 
own  strips.  In  the  clear  water  of  the  meres 
boys  are  bathing  and  swimming,  disturbing 
the  fishermen  in  their  light  skiffs  of  wicker 
and  skin,  or  sending  the  waterfowl  whirling 
up  in  a  cloud  only  to  circle  and  settle  a  little 
further  off. 


Chapter  V. 

The  Danes 

But  while  Cambridge  began  to  draw  the  life 
of  the  countryside  round  its  two  towns,  the 
coast  of  Anglia  was  overhung  by  a  worse  form 
of  the  danger  that  had  always  threatened  it 
since  the  Roman  Count  had  watched  for 
pirates  on  the  Saxon  shore. 

In  787  a.d.  three  ships,  better  manned  and 
longer  than  any  of  the  Saxon  or  English  ones, 
but  built  like  them  narrow  and  light  with 
high  carved  beak  and  stern  and  steered  by  a 
fixed  stern  oar,  came  lifting  and  falling  over 
the  crests  of  the  North  Sea.  Watchmen, 
who  first  espied  the  coloured  sails  and  strange 
Raven  banner,  ran  hot-foot  to  warn  the  Reeve, 
whom  the  King  had  chosen  to  rule  that 
country. 

"  Then  the  Reeve  rode  to  the  place,  and 
would  have  driven  them  to  the  King's  town, 
because  he  knew  not  what  men  they  were. 
And  then  and  there  did  they  slay  him.     These 


56  LIFE   IN   OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

were  the  first  ships  of  Danish  men  that  sought 
the  land  of  Angle-kin."  l 

So  without  warning  or  parley  began  the 
first  of  the  Norse  raids,  which  were  once  more 
to  make  East  Anglia  and  Cambridgeshire 
desolate.  Fleet  after  fleet  came  on  before 
the  North-east  wind  and  raced  up  the  river 
mouths,  the  ships  rowed  by  30  or  40  oars 
apiece.  The  crews  hauled  up  their  boats  and 
built  or  seized  a  stronghold  on  the  higher 
ground,  where  they  could  be  secure  through 
the  winter  months  ;  thence  they  would  march 
out  afoot  or  on  captured  horses,  raid  the  great 
abbeys,  sacking  all  their  wealth  and  burning 
the  fine  stone  and  timber  towers  till  they 
flared  like  beacons  of  disaster  over  the  red- 
dened water  of  the  Fens. 

Thetford  was  commonly  the  headquarters 
of  this  pagan  army,  and  from  there  they  must 
have  marched  by  Cambridge  every  time  they 
would  go  inland  either  to  York  or  the  Mid- 
lands or  over  the  Chiltern  Hills  to  harry 
Bucks,  and  Hertfordshire  and  the  soft  Thames 
Valley.  In  870  a.d.  they  rode  back  and 
martyred  St.  Edmund  at  Bury,  "  and  trod 

1  Anglo-Saxon  Chronicle,  787  a.d. 


THE   DANES  57 

down  all  the  land  and  brake  down  all  the 
Minsters  that  ever  they  came  to,"  even  Ely 
not  escaping.  In  875  three  of  the  Viking 
chiefs  "  sat  down  "  in  Cambridge  "  one  whole 
year,"  until  at  last  they  were  overpowered 
and  had  to  "  steal  away "  westwards  into 
Dorsetshire.  Three  years  later  Alfred  beat 
their  host  at  Ethandune  in  the  hills  of  Somer- 
set near  Athelney,  baptized  their  leader, 
Guthrum,  in  the  font  at  little  Aller  (pro- 
nounced Oiler)  by  the  Parrot  and  so  made 
peace,  dividing  the  land  between  them. 
Cambridge,  lying  just  north  of  the  boundary, 
the  River  Lea  and  Watling  Street,  fell  to  the 
share  of  the  Lords  Danes  and  was  ruled  by 
their  Lagemen  from  the  Moot  place  by  the 
bridge. 

In  905  a.d.  Alfred's  son  Edward  took  arms 
again  and  drove  the  Danes  northward  from 
the  Watling  Street  boundary,  and  here  in 
Cambridgeshire  his  Kentish  men,  lingering 
under  Siwulf  the  Alderman,  and  Kenwulf 
the  Abbot,  fought  to  a  standstill  on  the 
Dykes,  slaying  the  Danish  King  but  losing 
their  own  leaders  and  the  field  of  battle. 
Seven  years   later,   Edward   and  his  sister, 


58  LIFE   IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

Ethelfled,  Lady  of  the  Mercians,  gathered 
their  joint  strength  and  laid  down  sound 
plans  of  conquest.  Marching  steadily  north- 
east, they  gave  battle  again  and  again  and 
won  back  stretch  after  stretch  of  the  country  ; 
built  earthen  strongholds  to  keep  it  secure ; 
planted  new  settlements  of  Wessex  men  as 
at  St.  Ives,  and  grouped  the  Hundreds  in 
Counties  round  each  of  the  reviving  towns. 
And  so  at  last  in  921  a.d.  "  all  the  (Danish) 
host  among  the  East  Anglians  swore  to  be  at 
one  with  King  Edward,  that  they  would  all 
that  he  would,  and  would  hold  peace  toward 
all  to  whom  the  King  should  grant  his  peace, 
both  by  sea  and  land.  And  in  especial  did 
the  host  which  owed  fealty  to  Cambridge 
choose  him  to  father  and  to  lord  ;  and  there- 
to swore  oaths,  even  as  he  then  bade  it." 

Each  hundred  in  the  new  county  of  Cam- 
bridgeshire held  some  ten  villages  or  "  tith- 
ings,"  where  each  man  was  known  to  his 
neighbours  and  answerable  to  the  whole 
village  for  any  misdeed,  as  was  the  "  tithing  " 
itself  to  its  fellow- villages  and  to  the  Hundred 
moot. 

Cambridgeshire,   Suffolk   and  Norfolk  lay 


THE    DANES  59 

apart  from  the  rest  of  England,  eut  off  by 
the  waters,  all  but  an  island  and  hard  to  come 
at  even  from  the  south.  While  loyal  to  Edward's 
heirs,  these  counties  lived  a  life  of  their  own 
and  their  Hundred  moots  seem  to  have  sent 
men  to  a  Witan  of  their  own,1  which  every 
freeman  might  attend  from  all  East  Anglia, 
though  few  probably  troubled  to  take  long 
journeys  to  do  so.  At  the  Witan  presided 
an  Alderman  for  all  three  shires,  the  most 
famous  being  Brithnoth.  The  Ramsey  Chron- 
icler tells  how  this  hero  marched  out  to  his 
last  battle  with  the  Danes  at  the  Blackwater 
in  Essex.  On  the  way  he  refused  to  take 
food  unless  the  men  of  his  hearthward  or 
bodyguard  could  share  it.  "I  cannot  fight 
without  my  men,  neither  will  I  feed  without 
them."  The  battle  is  recorded  in  the  famous 
saga  called  "  The  song  of  Maldon."  They 
had  reached  the  place  of  battle,  and  Brithnoth 
dismounted  to  fight  among  his  men  on  foot 
as  Saxons  did,  when  the  Vikings  sent  a  mes- 
senger to  demand  ransom  : — 

"  Thy  realm  may  est  thou  ransom 
By  sending  the  Seamen, 

1  Anglo-Saxon  Chronicle,  1004  a.d. 


60  LIFE   IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

To  their  own  full  doom  (i.e.  terms), 

Gear  and  gift. 

Then  back  with  our  booty 

To  ship  will  we  get  us, 

Fare  forth  on  the  flood 

And  pass  you  in  peace." 

Brithnoth  answered  as  a  true  Englishman 

"  Hear  thou,  sailor, 
What  saith  this  people, 
For  ransom  we  give  you 
Full  freely  our  weapons, 
Spear-edge  and  sword-edge 
Of  old  renown. 

This  bode  in  return 

Bear  back  to  thy  shipmates, 

This  word  of  high  warning, 

That  here  stand  undaunted 

A  chief  with  his  chosen  : 

This  land  will  we  fight  for, 

For  Ethelred's  realm, 

For  our  King,  folk,  and  country. 

Then  waded  the  water 
Those  wolves  of  the  slaughter 
Nor  stayed  them  the  stream  : 
Pressed  over  Panta  (Blackwater) 
The  Vikings'  war  : 
O'er  the  wan  waterway 
Weapons  they  waved, 
Their  shields  to  shore 
The  shipmen  bore." 


THE   DANES  61 

The  fight  was  bitter ;  the  Danes  were  so 
badly  mauled  that  they  made  off  without 
waiting  for  more  "  ransom,"  but  Brithnoth 
fell,  and  his  faithful  hearthward  bore  his  head- 
less body  back  to  Ely.  There  they  had  rested 
and  feasted  on  their  way  out,  and  Brithnoth 
had  repaid  the  Abbot's  hospitality  by  princely 
gifts,  the  grant  of  jurisdiction  over  many 
villages  of  his  in  Cambridgeshire.  Among 
them  were  Trumpington,  Teversham,  Trip- 
low,  Fulbourn,  Hardwicke,  Impington,  Crox- 
ton,  Soham,  and  Papworth.  His  widow  gave 
a  golden  collar  and  a  tapestry  record  of  his 
deeds  to  the  abbey,  and  there  his  tomb  can 
still  be  seen.  It  was  King  Alfred  who  had 
revived  Ely  after  the  Danish  raids,  sending 
eight  monks  to  repair  one  aisle  of  the  old 
church,  and  this  served  nineteen  years  later 
as  a  refuge  to  the  whole  country-side.  King 
Sweyn  had  come  to  take  vengeance  for  the 
treacherous  massacre  of  his  subjects  on  St. 
Brice's  Day.  The  men  of  Cambridge  made 
a  heroic  stand  at  Ringmere,  and  the  King 
punished  it  by  a  merciless  harrying  of  the 
whole  district  with  fire  and  sword. 

In  1010  a.d.,  "  while  all  England  shook  " 


62  LIFE   IN   OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

before  Sweyn  "as  a  reedbed  rustling  before 
the  wind,"  Ulfcytel,  "the  Ready,"  Brith- 
noth's  successor  as  Alderman,  rallied  the 
forces  of  whom  the  Danes  themselves  had 
said  in  1004  that  "  never  worse  hand-play 
had  they  met  in  England  "  ;  he  stood  against 
them  at  Ringmere,  but  his  forces  broke ; 
"  Soon  fled  the  East  English.  Then  stood 
fast  Grantabrygshire  alone  "  ;  so  fast  stood 
they  and  so  worthily  that  "  while  English 
kings  rule,  the  praise  of  Cambridgeshire  shall 
flourish."  But  no  one  shire  could  long  with- 
stand a  king's  host,  and  the  Danes  took  the 
fiercer  vengeance,  riding  throughout  the  dis- 
trict for  three  weary  months,  destroying  all 
save  Ely,  safe  behind  her  floods.  Cambridge 
was  sacked  and  burnt.  "  And  they  even 
went  into  the  wild  fens,  and  there  they  des- 
troyed men  and  cattle  and  burned  throughout 
the  fens.  What  could  be  moved  that  did 
they  lift,  what  they  might  not  carry  that  did 
they  burn  .  .  .  and  so  marched  they  up  and 
down  the  land."1  Of  all  the  villages  none 
suffered  more  than  Balsham,  small  and  re- 
mote as  it  was.     The  old  church  tower  still 

1  See  Ingulf.     History  of  Croyland. 


THE   DANES 


63 


stands  with  the  narrow  winding  stairway  on 
which  one  man  barricaded  himself  safely, 
only  to  find  when  the  raiders  rode  off  that  all 


£avot)Btot)3C-gUt  Disc ,  set  u>Ub  Kve 
gart)ets,el[c.  Foutj&at  Atiujciton  HUl , 
0ucTT)UcBo1Xott)  Caxtjbrldgcsbvrc- 

his  kinsfolk  were  slain  or  enslaved,  and  he 
alone  remained  of  the  whole  ham.  At  Bar- 
rington  fierce  fighting  seems  to  have  held  the 


64  LIFE   IN   OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

ford  across  the  Cam,  for  there  were  found  in 
1875  skeletons  of  men  and  horses,  a  "  seaxe," 
shield-bosses,  swords,  daggers,  spearheads,  a 
green  glass  brooch  with  the  Danish  snake- 
headed  raven  cut  upon  it,  and  a  bronze 
charm  with  Saracenic  characters  such  as  the 
Danes  wore,  and  which  are  still  found  from 
time  to  time  in  places  where  they  lived  in 
England.  The  final  battle  of  Assandun,  in 
which  Edmund  Ironside  was  defeated,  was 
perhaps  fought  at  Ashdon  on  the  borders  of 
Cambridgeshire. 

The  Danes,  after  harrying  Mercia,  had 
made  off  towards  the  ships  they  had  left  in 
the  Thames  estuary;  but  Edmund,  guided 
perhaps  by  the  monks  of  Ely,1  who  would 
have  watched  the  line  of  smoking  villages 
left  in  the  enemy's  wake,  made  hard  after 
them,  and  overtook  them  by  the  rising 
Bourne.  There  the  king  charged  under  his 
royal  banner  and  the  Golden  Dragon  flag  of 
Wessex.  "  Brandishing  his  good  sword,  he 
clove  like  a  thunder-bolt  the  Danish  battle- 
line,"  but  some  felon  raised  the  cry  "  Flet 
Engle,"   Dead  is   Edmund,"    and  started  a 

1  See  Liber  EHensis,  p.  196. 


THE   DANES  65 

panic.  "  Thus  did  he  betray  his  King  and 
Lord  and  the  whole  people  of  Angle-kin. 
There  did  the  whole  English  nation  fight 
against  him  ;  and  there  had  Cnut  the  victory. 
There  was  slain  Bishop  Ednoth  (of  London) 
.  .  .  and  Ulfcytel  of  East  Anglia.  .  .  .  And 
all  the  nobility  of  the  English  nation  was  there 
undone."1  In  1020  a.d.  Cnut  built  at  Assandun 
"  a  minster  of  stone  and  lime,  for  the  souls  of 
the  men  who  were  there  slain."2  For  Cnut 
was  Christian  and  a  good  king,  and  befriended 
Ely  though  the  monks  had  gone  against  him 
at  Assandun.  Many  stories  are  told  of  his 
love  of  Ely  ;   of  his  song  : — 

Merry  sang  the  monks  in  Ely 

As  Cnut,  king,  rowed  there  by. 

""  Steer  lads  near  the  land 

And  hear  we  the  monks  chant." 

Merie  sungen  the  Muneches  binnen  Ely 
Da  Cnut  ching  reu  ther  by. 
"  Roweth  cnites  noer  the  land 
And  here  we  ther  Muneches  saeng." 

Of  his  love  of  attending  the  services  at  Ely 
the  quaintest  tale  is  told. 

The  Feast  of  the  Purification  was  at  hand. 
Cnut  was  at  Soham  and  could  not  get  through 

1  Anglo-tSuxon  Chronicle,  1010.  2  Canterbury  Chronicle. 


66  LIFE   IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

to  Ely  by  reason  of  the  unusual  frost  and  ice. 
"  The  water  of  the  marshes  was  frozen.  His 
good  mind  would  not  change,  but  he  was 
anxious  and  groaning.  He  thought,  trusting 
in  the  Lord  God,  to  cross  the  mere  from  Soham 
to  Ely  in  a  sledge  if  the  hard  frost  did  not 
stop,  but  that  he  would  make  the  rough 
journey  with  more  safety  and  with  less  fear 
if  someone  should  go  before  him.  Now  by 
chance  there  stood  by  in  the  crowd  a  great 
hulking  man  from  the  Isle,  one  Brihtmer 
Budde,  so  called  from  his  thickness.  He 
offered  to  go  before  the  king.  They  crossed 
safely,  and  Cnut  constantly  told  the  story, 
and  praised  God  for  the  wonder  that  so  great 
and  bulky  a  rustic  should  make  not  the  least 
stumble  on  the  way,  so  that  he  himself,  being 
both  active  and  of  small  size,  could  follow 
straight  on  without  fear."  So  pleased  was  he 
that  he  called  Brihtmer  to  his  presence 
and  granted  the  serf  freedom  and  possession 
of  his  hut  and  land  for  ever  ;  and  the  Ely 
monk  who  tells  the  tale  says  "  his  children's 
children  live  there  free  and  in  peaceable  pos- 
session to  this  day."1 

1  Liber  Eliensis,  p.  203. 


Xfyejbwer  of  JD  J3et)et's  C^)urc1?;  Ckotrdcc. 


68  LIFE   IN    OLD   CAMBRIDGE 

It  was  about  this  time  that  the  burnt  huts 
of  Cambridge  must  have  been  rebuilt,  for 
Cnut  had  a  mint  at  the  town,  and  the  coins 
made  here  were  marked  with  the  old  name  of 
the  place,  "  Grant "  for  "  Grantebrigge." 
It  was  perhaps  soon  after  this  that  the 
first  stone  church,  St.  Benet's,  was  built. 
Most  of  the  churches  of  those  days  were 
made  of  timber,  and  the  masons  who  built 
St.  Benet's  tried  to  make  the  stone  they 
used  into  the  round  shape  of  turned  logs  to 
decorate  the  windows,  as  you  may  see  in  the 
tower  of  that  church. 

Of  the  life  of  Cambridge  in  later  Saxon 
times  we  do  not  know  much,  though  Domesday 
Book  tells  us  that  the  Confessor's  Sheriff 
made  each  burgher  or  free  householder  in  the 
town  "  pay  for  his  protection  three  days' 
ploughing  yearly  or  the  value  of  it  in  money, 
as  well  as  the  "  heriot  "  of  20s.  paid  when  they 
came  into  their  land.  Somewhere  about  this 
time,  too,  the  people  of  standing,  called  thanes, 
joined  in  a  gild,  partly  to  help  each  other  in 
time  of  need,  partly  to  keep  order  and  put  an 
end  to  bloodshed.  It  is  one  of  the  oldest 
gilds  in  all  England,  and  Cambridge  may  well 


THE   DANES  69 

be  glad  to  have  the  record  of  some  of  its 
rules. 

Gild  of  Thanes  of  Cambridge 

"  Here  in  this  writing  is  the  declaration  of  the  laws 
which  the  members  of  the  Gild  of  Thanes  at  Granta- 
brycge  have  resolved  upon. 

The  first  is  that  each  give  his  oath  to  the  others  on 
the  sacrament  of  fidelity  before  God  and  before  the 
world,  and  the  whole  society  shall  (up)hold  him  that  has 
most  right. 

If  any  member  die  let  the  whole  gildship  bring  him 
(for  burial)  to  the  place  he  chooses,  and  he  who  does  not 
come  thereto  shall  pay  a  syster1  of  honey  ;  and  the  gild- 
ship  shall  pay  half  of  the  expense  of  the  funeral  feast  of 
the  departed  ;  and  each  shall  give  twopence2  in  alms, 
and  as  much  of  the  sum  collected  as  is  right  shall  be 
offered  at  St.  Atheldritha's. 

And  if  any  member  have  need  of  the  assistance  of  his 
fellow  members,  and  it  be  told  the  reeve  nearest  that 
member,  in  the  case  of  the  member  not  being  near,  and 
the  reeve  neglect  it  he  shall  pay  a  pound.  And  if  the 
Lord  (of  the  gild)  neglect  it  he  shall  pay  a  pound,  unless 
he  be  on  Lord's  need3  or  be  very  sick. 

If  anyone  kill  a  member  let  the  fine  be  not  less  than 
eight  pounds.  Then  if  the  slayer  refuse  to  pay  the  fine 
let  all  the  gildship  avenge  the  member  and  every  one 
bear  his  share.     If  one  do  it4  let  all  bear  equally.    And 

1  A  syster  is  probably  15  pints. 

2  The  penny  was  worth  about  3d. 

3  On  business  of  his  office. 

4  i.e.  if  one  does  vengeance. 


70  LIFE   IN   OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

if  any  member  slay  a  man  and  he  be  needy  and  he  must 
make  compensation  for  his  deed,  and  the  slain  man  be  a 
man  of  twelve  hundred  shillings,1  let  each  member  give 
half  a  mark2  to  help  him.  If  the  man  slain  be  a  ceorl  let 
each  give  two  oras,3  if  a  Welshman4  one  ora.  If  the 
member  slay  any  one  by  wrong  and  by  folly  let  himself 
bear  the  consequence  of  what  he  has  done.  And  if  a 
member  slay  his  fellow  member  by  his  own  folly  let  him 
satisfy  the  kinsman  himself,  and  buy  again  his  place  in 
the  gild  with  eight  pounds,  or  lose  for  ever  the  right  of 
fellowship  and  fraternity.  And  if  any  member  eat  or 
drink  with  him  who  has  slain  his  fellow  member  unless  it 
be  in  the  presence  of  the  king,5  or  of  the  bishop  of  the 
province,  or  of  the  aldermen,  he  shall  pay  a  pound,  unless 
he  can  make  it  appear  by  two  witnesses  that  he  did  not 
know  him. 

If  any  member  abuse  another  let  him  pay  a  syster  of 
honey,  and  if  anyone  abuse  one  not  a  member,  let  him 
pay  one  syster  of  honey,  unless  he  can  clear  himself  by 
his  two  witnesses. 

If  a  servant  draw  his  sword  let  his  lord  pay  a  pound 
and  the  lord  may  have  it  as  he  can,  and  let  all  the  gildship 
help  him  that  he  recover  his  money.  And  if  a  servant 
wound  another,  let  the  lord  (of  the  wounded)  avenge  it, 
and  let  the  whole  gildship  inquire  that  he  have  not  life. 

And  if  a  servant  waylay  a  man  he  shall  pay  a  syster  of 

1  i.e.  of  weregild  rated  at  1,200  shillings,  but  its  value  varied 

constantly. 

2  Mark  =  13/4. 

3  Ora  was  of  two  kinds  16  pence  and  20  pence. 

4  Welsh  commonly  used  for  British,  i.e.  non-Saxon. 

6  Wherever  the  king  went  his  "peace"  went  with  him  and 
thus  gave  sanctuary. 


THEJ3ANES  71 

honey,  and  if  anyone  have  a  foot-setting  he  shall  do  the 
same. 

And  if  any  member  die  or  be  sick  abroad  his  fellow 
members  shall  fetch  him  and  bring  him  dead  or  alive 
whither  he  wishes,  under  the  same  penalty  as  has  been 
named.  If  he  die  at  home  the  member  who  does  not  go 
to  fetch  his  body,  and  the  member  who  does  not  attend 
his  morrow  speech,  shall  pay  his  syster  of  honey." 

Some  of  these  rules  are  not  easy  to  under- 
stand. "  Let  the  whole  gildship  inquire  that 
he  have  not  life  "  seems  to  mean  that  they 
are  to  set  justice  to  work  to  punish  the  crime 
with  death.  The  word  foot-setting  is  prob- 
ably used  for  "  trap  "  or  "  snare  "  ;  and  the 
"  morrow  speech "  is  no  doubt  a  meeting 
held  in  praise  of  the  dead.  We  do  not  know 
the  later  history  of  this  gild,  but  it  is  tempting 
to  guess  that  it  was  the  germ  of  the  ruling 
group  known  as  "  the  men  of  Cambridge  " 
since  it  was  made  up  of  the  thanes. 

Not  long  before  this,  about  the  year  930,  a  law 
had  been  made  that  "  If  any  man  fare  three 
times  over  the  Wide  Sea  (?  North  Sea)  by  his 
own  means,  he  shall  be  of  thane-right  worthy," 
and  it  may  be  that  some  of  these  Cambridge 
thanes  had  risen  in  this  way.  A  gild  of  water- 
merchants  ruled  at  this  time  in  Paris,  which 


72  LIFE    IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

still  uses  their  seal  of  a  sailing  ship  ;  perhaps 
our  gild  of  thanes  did  the  same  for  Cambridge. 
Many  gilds  arose  in  the  next  three  centuries, 
and  every  one  of  them  was  under  the  guardian- 
ship of  some  holy  saint.  For  the  Church  took 
care  to  guide  and  help  men  in  all  their  doings, 
and  no  man  would  have  dared  to  do  without 
its  help,  not  even  the  king.  In  this  way  the 
Church  had  learned  to  make  good  rules  and 
plans,  and  it  is  no  doubt  partly  from  such 
bodies  as  the  gilds,  and  partly  from  having 
to  judge  of  fair-play  in  the  Moots  that  Saxon 
townsmen  learned  to  manage  their  own  town 
affairs.  The  Church  had  practised  managing 
matters  for  nearly  six  hundred  years  in  Italy 
and  France  and  the  countries  of  the  Mediter- 
ranean before  St.  Augustine  came  to  England, 
so  his  followers  could  aid  the  Saxon  kings  to 
write  down  their  best  customs  as  laws  or 
"  dooms,"  and  to  plan  their  councils.  These 
little  bands  of  peaceable  townsfolk  joining 
together  against  any  troubles  that  might  come 
upon  them,  illness  or  fire  or  raiding  pirates 
or  plundering  barons  must  have  learned  that 
"  union  is  strength,"  and  the  Church  sanc- 
tioned and  guided  the  clubs  they  formed,  and 


THE   DANES  73 

encouraged  them  to  meet  in  the  churches. 
Gilds  were  formed  to  do  neighbourly  work, 
to  feast  together  or  walk  in  procession  in 
honour  of  their  saint  or  founder  ;  to  say  ser- 
vices and  hear  masses  for  one  who  died,  care 
for  his  burial,  put  together  money  for  his 
widow,  and  look  after  his  children ;  also 
they  made  rules  that  work  should  be  carefully 
and  honestly  done,  and  no  man  defrauded 
of  what  was  due  to  him. 


Chapter  VI. 

The   Norman  Years 

Already  we  have  traced  a  number  of  changes 
in  the  life  of  Cambridge.  We  come  now  to 
the  greatest,  the  Norman  conquest ;  each 
left  some  mark  in  the  customs  and  character 
of  the  people  here  as  in  the  rest  of  England, 
and  this  the  most.  The  wide,  well-managed 
villa-farms  of  the  Romano-British  had  been 
covered  up  by  the  free  villages  of  the  Saxon 
kin  with  their  lands  owned  and  tilled  in 
"  common  "  fields.  These  again  were  mas- 
tered in  part  by  the  Vikings,  and  the  Dane 
law  governed  all  the  towns  north  of  Watling 
Street,  making  them  more  eager  for  trade 
and  shipping  than  other  parts.  The  English 
"  earls  "  yielded  to  Danish  "  jarls  "  of  higher 
standing,  and  when  Edward  the  Confessor 
died,  Jarl  Gyrth,  Godwin's  son  was  ruler  of 
all  East  Anglia,  and  led  his  housecarls  to  his 
brother  Harold's  aid  at  Hastings,  only  to 
fall  beside  him.  We  know  little  in  detail  of 
the  doings  of  Cambridge  folk  in  the  first  years 


THE  NORMAN  YEARS  75 

of  the  Conquest  except  that  the  reason 
William  built  one  of  his  new  castles,  probably 
of  earth  and  timber,  on  the  hilltop  was,  as 
Fuller  says,  "  that  it  might  be  a  checkbit  to 
curb  this  country  which  otherwise  was  so 
hard-mouthed  to  be  ruled."  This  was  done 
as  he  marched  homewards  in  1068  from  his 
stern  handling  of  rebellious  Yorkshire.  Now 
as  of  old  to  hold  the  Cam  bridge-way  was  to 
grip  the  key  of  this  country-side,  and  William 
was  too  good  a  king  to  miss  it.  Two  years 
later,  however,  Ely  became  the  City  of  Refuge 
for  all  who  withstood  him.  In  1070  a.d. 
"  came  King  Sweyne  from  Denmark1  into  the 
Humber.  .  .  .  Then  came  into  Ely  Christien, 
the  Danish  bishop,  and  Earl  Osbern,  and  the 
Danish  domestics  with  them  ;  and  the  Eng- 
lish people  from  all  the  fen-lands  came  to 
them,  supposing  that  they  should  win  all 
that  land.  Then  the  monks  of  Peterborough 
heard  say,  that  their  own  men  would  plunder 
the  minster  ;  namely  Hereward  and  his  gang  ; 
because  they  understood  that  the  king  had 
given  the  abbacy  to  a  French  abbot,  whose 
name  was  Thorold.  .  .  .  Then  came  they  in 

1  Not  to  be  confused  with  Cnut's  father. 


76  LIFE    IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

through  fire  at  the  Bullhithe  Gate  ;  where 
the  monks  met  them  and  besought  peace  of 
them.  But  they  regarded  nothing.  They 
went  into  the  minster,  climbed  up  into  the 
holy  rood,  took  away  the  diadem  from  our 
Lord's  head,  all  of  pure  gold,  and  seized  the 
bracket  that  was  under  His  feet,  which  was  all 
of  red  gold.  They  climbed  up  into  the 
steeple,  brought  down  the  table  that  was  hid 
there,  which  was  all  of  gold  and  silver,  seized 
two  golden  shrines,  and  nine  of  silver,  and  took 
away  fifteen  large  crucifixes,  of  gold  and  of 
silver ;  in  short,  they  seized  there  so  much 
gold  and  silver,  and  so  many  treasures,  in 
money,  in  raiment,  and  in  books,  as  no  man 
could  tell  another  ;  and  said,  that  they  did  it 
from  attachment  to  the  minster."1  The  next 
year  "  went  Earl  Morkar  to  Ely  by  ship  ; 
but  Earl  Edwin  was  treacherously  slain  by 
his  own  men.  Then  came  Bishop  Aylwine, 
and  Siward  Barn,  and  many  hundred  men 
with  him,  into  Ely."  They  crowded  in  across 
the  marshes  to  the  little  island,  ten  miles  long 
by  five  wide,  and  found  there  abundance  of 
food  in  the  corn  and  cattle  of  the  Abbey,  the 

1  See  Anglo-Saxon  Chronicle,  1070. 


THE   NORMAN   YEARS  77 

stags,  goats,  hares,  fish  and  fowl  of  all  kinds  that 
the  island  produced.  A  Norman  knight  whom 
they  captured  told  afterwards  how  they  fared. 
"  In  the  eddies  at  the  sluices  of  these  meres 
are  netted  innumerable  eels,  large  water- 
wolves,  with  pickerels,  perches,  roaches,  bur- 
bots, and  lampreys,  which  we  call  water- 
snakes.  There  you  find  geese,  teal,  coot  .  .  . 
herons  and  ducks,  more  than  men  can  number. 
...  I  have  seen  a  hundred — nay,  even  three 
hundred — taken  at  once,  sometimes  by  bird- 
lime, sometimes  in  nets  or  snares."1 

Thus  stored  with  food  of  all  sorts  and  sur- 
rounded by  the  great,  natural  moat  of  the 
Fens,  Ely  made  a  first-rate  stronghold.  The 
monk  Thomas  of  Ely,  who  tells  the  story, 
says,  "  King  William,  when  he  knew  that  most 
strong  fighter,  Hereward  to  be  there,  gathered 
exceeding  much  valour  to  fight  against  them, 
and  devised  evil  against  the  holy  place  and 
how  to  ruin  it."  With  his  boats-carls  he 
came  up  the  Ouse  to  Brandon  and  Reach  on 
the  east  to  beset  the  Isle,  "  with  a  host  which 
no  man  could  number,"  while  on  the  south  he 
had  others  to  try  to  make  a  causeway  over 

1  Liber  Eliensis,  p.  232. 


78  LIFE   IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

the  marsh  with  faggots  and  sandbags  from 
Willingham  to  Aldreth.  But  Hereward  led 
sallies  out  against  them,  drove  them  off  and 
bore  back  much  spoil  into  the  Isle.  "  When 
the  king  heard  that  he  was  wroth  and  com- 
manded to  summon  the  strong  and  brave 
from  all  the  townships  and  towns  to  hunt 
them  out."  These  Hereward  again  beat  off, 
and  then  the  king's  great  men  came  to  him 
and  said,  '"Let  us  make  peace  with  yonder 
men  ;  for  the  place  which  we  beset  is  fortified 
and  we  do  not  prevail  against  them  :  ac- 
cording to  the  traditions  of  their  fathers  have 
they  borne  themselves  against  us.  And  the 
word  was  pleasing  in  the  eyes  of  the  King 
and  of  his  princes  :  he  sent  to  them  to  make 
peace.'  .  .  .  But  the  English  outlaws  hardly 
trusted  him,  and  soon  claimed  that  he  had 
broken  faith  with  some  of  their  friends  and 
the  struggle  began  again.  Once  more  William 
tried  his  plan  of  a  causeway,  '  he  ordered  all 
kinds  of  things  to  be  thrown  in,  many  trees 
and  faggots  not  a  few,  with  sheepskins  scraped 
and  filled  with  sand,'  but  this  time  when  his 
soldiers  rushed  on  to  it,  eager  to  get  at  the 
rich  plunder  of  the  abbey,  it  gave  way  under 


THE   NORMAN   YEARS  79 

them  and  many  were  drowned  or  choked  in  the 
mud.  Then  the  story  tells  that  a  sorceress 
was  brought  and  set  in  a  tower  to  hearten 
the  troops  by  her  incantations.  Now  Here- 
ward  did  a  brave  thing.  He  wanted  to  find 
out  their  plans,  so  taking  his  pet  mare,  Swallow, 
who  always  looked  awkward  and  flagging, 
but  was  of  fine  breed,  extraordinary  speed 
and  active  to  endure  long  lasting  work,  he 
dressed  up  as  a  potter.  He  cropped  his  long, 
thick  hair  and  beard,  put  on  the  pale  clay- 
smeared  smock  and  took  the  earthenware 
pots.  That  evening  he  got  to  the  witch's 
house  and  she  took  him  in,  thinking  him  a 
poor  man.  He  spent  the  night  there  and  could 
have  killed  her  but  wanted  to  hear  the  plans 
she  was  making.  In  the  morning  he  slung 
the  pots  on  his  shoulders  again  and  went 
along,  shouting  out  "Pots,  pots,  good  pots 
and  bowls  :  earthenware  of  all  sorts  and  the 
best  make,"  and  so  made  his  way  to  the 
quarters  of  the  king.  Then  he  was  taken 
by  the  king's  servants  into  the  kitchen,  where 
they  bought  pots.  Where  amongst  others 
present  was  a  reeve  from  the  neighbourhood, 
who  swore  that  he  had  never  seen  anyone 


80  LIFE    IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

looking  more  like  Hereward.  And  when  he 
said  so  busybodies  and  hangers-on  ran  up 
from  all  directions  to  spy  and  make  up  their 
minds  whether  it  really  was  Hereward  or  a 
man  like  him,  and  this  story  became  known 
in  the  Hall  among  the  pages  and  nobles.  And 
looking  hard  at  him  they  would  not  believe 
that  clumsy  countryman  to  be  Hereward 
and  denied  it.  He  stood  like  a  stupid  and 
made  no  reply  to  those  who  questioned  him  in 
French,  although  he  understood  it  very  well. 
For  they  asked  if  he  had  sometimes  seen  or 
known  that  rascal.  To  whom  at  last  he  gave 
this  answer  in  English :  Would  that  that 
man  of  Belial  were  here  now,  hateful  to  me  in 
everything ;  I  might  be  well  avenged  of  him. 
For  he  himself  stole  my  one  cow  and  four 
sheep  so  that  I  am  forced  miserably  to  beg 
and  thrown  into  such  great  misery  that  I  can 
scarcely  carry  on  a  wretched  life  by  means  of 
this  mare  and  the  pots,  with  great  shame  and 
toil. 

"  And  while  this  bickering  was  going  on, 
one  came  from  the  king's  presence  and  ordered 
them  to  hasten  the  king's  meal ;  on  which 
account  the  wrangling  died  down  meanwhile. 


THE   NORMAN    YEARS  81 

But  before  long  the  cooks  and  riff-raff  eating 
and  drinking  got  thoroughly  drunk,  and 
noticing  Hereward,  thought  him  a  dolt ;  so 
they  seized  him  with  his  pots  all  round  him, 
blindfolded  him  and  drove  him  on  to  them 
to  smash  them.  Then  thumping  him  with 
their  fists  they  tried  cruelly  to  pull  out  the 
hair  on  his  chin  and  by  way  of  a  game  to  shave 
his  head.  But  it  hardly  happened  as  they 
expected,  they  soon  paid  the  forfeit.  At 
this  point,  when  try  as  he  might  he  could  no 
longer  keep  his  temper,  one  of  them  hit  him 
on  the  head,  whom  in  return  he  gave  back  a 
blow  under  his  ear  so  that  he  fell  as  if  dead. 
When  his  comrades  saw  that,  all  fell  upon 
him  with  prongs  and  forks,  and  he,  seizing  a 
stake  from  the  hearth,  defended  himself 
against  them  all,  one  being  killed  and  many 
wounded.  He  was  seized,  dragged  out  and 
made  over  to  the  guard.  And  whilst  he  was 
kept  under  guard,  there  came  a  man  carrying 
fetters  in  one  hand  to  bind  him  and  a  drawn 
sword  in  the  other  :  which  Hereward  striking 
from  his  hand  seized  and  quickly  slew  him 
with  his  own  weapon  and  wounded  the  others. 
And  so  escaping  by  the  fence  he  found  his 


82  LIFE   IN   OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

mare  and  mounted  her,  and  as  she  galloped 
off  the  crowd  of  lads  tried  to  pursue  her ; 
but  her  great  speed  plunged  him  with  her  into 
the  wood  of  Sumersham  and  by  the  light  of 
the  moon  he  came  by  night  into  the  Isle  and 
set  his  armed  men  where  ever  there  were  con- 
venient points,  lest  by  chance  any  trouble 
from  the  enemy  should  come  upon  them 
unawares. 

Now  when  the  king,  returning  home  knew 
of  this,  he  applauded  Hereward's  unconquer- 
able courage,  giving  orders  positively  that  if  he 
were  at  any  time  seized  he  should  be  kept 
unharmed."  l 

Another  story  is  told  of  him  by  Gaimar,  in 
quaint  old  Norman-French  verses,  like  this: — 

Then  the  king  bade 

Build  a  bridge  over  marsh  ; 

Said  he  would  slay  all 

None  should  escape  him. 

When  these  knew  it  in  Ely 

They  put  them  at  his  mercy  ; 

All  went  crying  for  mercy 

Save  Here  ward,  right  bold. 

He  fled  with  few  folk 

Geri  with  him,  his  kinsman, 

With  them  were  five  comrades. 

1  Liber  Eliemis,  pp.  235-6. 


THE   NORMAN   YEARS  83 

A  man  who  brought  fish 

To  the  guards  along  the  marsh 

Played  the  true  man  and  courteous 

In  his  boat  took  them, 

With  reeds  and  flags  hid  them 

Towards  the  guards  began  rowing 

As  evening  grew  dusk, 

Nigh  their  camp  in  his  boat. 

The  French  were  in  a  tent 
Guy  the  Sheriff,  their  captain, 
He  knew  well  the  fisher, 
Knew  well  'twas  he  coming, 
Of  him  none  took  notice. 
They  saw  the  fisher  rowing, 
'Twas  night,  they  sat  eating. 

From  the  boat  came  forth  Hereward, 

Bold  as  a  leopard  ; 

His  comrades  came  after 

Made  for  the  tent  through  a  covert, 

With  them  followed  the  fisher. 

Hereward  was  erst  his  Lord. 

How  shall  I  tell  it  ?  the  knights 
Were  surprised  at  their  meal. 
Grasping  axes  entered  those, 
They  were  no  fools  at  striking 
Slew  twenty-six  Normans, 
Twelve  English  were  slain  there. 

Great  the  fear  through  the  dwellings, 
All  shared  in  the  flight, 


84  LIFE    IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

Left  horses  all  saddled, 

The  Outlaws  sprang  on  them, 

Each  chose  a  rare,  good  horse. 

The  wood  was  near,  they  entered  it, 

They  went  not  at  random, 

Knew  well  all  that  country, 

Had  many  their  friends  there. 

At  a  town  that  they  came  to 

Found  ten  of  their  party. 

These  joined  them  to  Hereward. 

Erst  were  they  eight,  now  were  ten  more. 

Eighteen  were  the  comrades. 

Before  they  passed  Huntingdon 

Had  a  hundred  well-armed  men 

Of  Hereward's  liege  vassals, 

They  were  his  men  and  faithful. 

Ere  the  morn's  sun  was  risen 

Seven  hundred  had  joined  him 

They  followed  to  Bruneswald.1 

By  such  deeds  of  rare  daring  and  craft 
Hereward  kept  up  the  courage  of  the  English 
and  beat  off  and  disheartened  William's 
Norman  vassals.  But  the  monks  of  Ely 
grew  weary  of  the  rough  life.  They  knew 
too  that  the  Holy  Father  at  Rome  had  blessed 
the  king's  banner  when  he  set  out,  and  being 
loyal    churchmen    and    learned    clerks    they 

1  Gaimar's  Chronicle  of  Hereward  contains  many  other  stories, 
mainly  legendary.  Gaimar,  Lestorie  des  Engles,  vol.  ii.  (see 
"  Rerum  Britannicarum.") 


THE  NORMAN   YEARS  85 

held  it  wrong  to  resist  the  Lord's  Anointed. 
So  they  sent  word  to  William  that  they  would 
submit  to  him  and  do  his  will,  and  they  showed 
him  a  way  across  the  marshes.  His  men 
followed  it,  and  entered  Ely,  and  Hereward 
was  forced  to  flee.  For  some  years  he  wan- 
dered as  an  outlaw,  but  William  had  always 
praised  his  gallant  spirit,  and  at  last  it  is  said 
that  he  made  friends  with  him  and  promised 
that  he  should  hold  his  lands  in  peace. 


Chapter  VII. 

Mediaeval    Cambridge 

In  the  fight  for  VAy,  Cambridge  was  the  King's 
headquarters,  and  Castle  Hill  must  have 
swarmed  with  the  barons  and  their  vassals, 

called  in  from  "  all  the  townships  and  towns," 
with  all  the  supplies  too  and  the  serfs  who 
had  to  bring  them  ;  the  bussearls  or  boatmen 
foreed  to  do  service  by  water  when  the  king 
summoned  them  ;  the  machines  of  siege,  and 
heavy  wagons  to  draw  them.  The  Cam 
would  he  crowded  with  boats,  rafts  of  timber 
and  faggots  for  the  causeway,  and  barges 
heavy  laden  with  goods  for  the  camp.  No 
doubt  all  this  brought  some  wealth  to  the 
burghers,  and  about  this  time  some  of  the 
oldest  buildings  began  to  rise.  William's 
first  Castle  was  most  likely  a  timber  one,  of 
two  or  three  stories,  no  wider  than  a  church 
tower,  it  was  probably  set  up  on  the  green 
mound  that  is  still  there,  made  by  William's 
men  to  bear  it.  The  bottom  story  would  be 
built  of  solid  logs  with  no  door  or  windows. 


MEDIAEVAL    CAMTJRTDflE 


87 


The  entrance  would  be  in  tho  second  storey, 
to  which  men  would  climb  up  by  a  ladder  or 
sloping  plank  that  could  be  drawn  up  after 
them  in  case  of  attack.  The  ground  iloor 
was  used  only  as  a  cellar  or  "  Donjon  "  to 
store  food    or    prisoners   in,    and   gave   that 


CaaBU  Hill ,  CAtubruixje , 
U)itl)  the  j'xeep  euij^tsttd.  , 

name  to  tho  whole  tower.  By  the  end  of  his 
reign  William  had  begun  to  build  stronger 
towers  of  stone,  called  keeps,  but  these  were 
often  too  heavy  for  the  earthen  mounds, 
which  gave  way  under  them.      Perhaps  that 


1  Aflur  the  pliin  of  Hrumljor  Custlo,  by  C.  Aulnlown. 
in  their  G lory  "  Horiea. 


Castlei 


88  LIFE   IN   OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

was  why  the  Keep  of  Cambridge  Castle  was 
built  afterwards  below  and  a  little  to  the 
north  of  the  motte  or  mound.  A  great  Gate- 
house was  also  built  on  the  Huntingdon  Road, 
and  four  smaller  towers  between  them.  These 
were  all  joined  to  one  another  by  stone  walls 
known  as  "  curtains."  The  Borough  covered 
the  whole  hilltop  from  Mt.  Pleasant  to 
Chesterton  Lane.  In  the  outer  Bailey,  or  close 
about  the  Castle  walls  would  cluster  the  huts 
of  the  villeins  and  serfs  who  gave  their  crops 
or  their  labour  for  the  right  to  their  land  and 
to  shelter  in  case  of  need.  Their  houses 
would  be  of  wattle  and  daub,  probably  one 
room  only  with  holes  for  window  or  chimney, 
thatched  and  surrounded  with  tiny  gardens  of 
herbs.  The  boundary  of  the  Castle  area 
where  Histon  Road  begins  was  marked  in 
later  days  by  a  stone  Cross  known  as  "  the 
High  Stone  Cross  at  Castle  End."  All  this 
part  of  Cambridge  was  sometimes  called  "  the 
Borough,"  and  the  oldest  houses  in  the  place 
are  still  to  be  found  there,  such  as  "  The  Old 
White  Horse  "  and  "  The  Three  Tuns  Inn." 

From  this  high  point  Cambridgeshire  was 
ruled  by  the  King's  Sheriff,  called  Picot.    He 


MEDIAEVAL   CAMBRIDGE  89 

had  been  made  lord  of  Bourn,  and  other 
manors.  He  or  his  successor  is  thought  to 
have  built  the  old  Manor  Hall,  now  called 
Merton  Hall.  It  was  the  sort  of  house  used 
by  the  Norman  gentry  everywhere,  one  long 
room  with  stone  pillars,  15|ft.  apart,  four  on 
each  side,  dividing  it  into  nave  and  aisles ;  one 
end  was  marked  off  by  screens  for  the  kitchen, 
and  at  the  other  end  an  alcove  built  out  at 
right  angles  was  the  private  parlour,  or 
"  soler "  of  the  Lord  and  Lady.  The  hall 
was  raised  on  vaulted  cellars  where  stores 
and  cattle  could  be  kept,  and  so  the  entrance 
was  by  some  stone  steps  forming  a  short  out- 
side stair.  In  the  one  great  room  the  whole 
life  went  on  ;  men  worked,  played,  fed,  and 
slept  there,  and  the  women  too.  Like  the 
smaller  houses  it  would  have  no  chimney, 
but  a  hole  in  the  centre  of  the  roof  over  the 
great  hearth,  though  this  was  covered  later 
by  a  little  turret  or  "  louver  "  with  open  sides, 
such  as  you  may  see  in  the  Hall  of  Queens'  or 
Peterhouse.  Old  pictures  shew  the  Hall 
with  a  thatched  and  gabled  roof,  and  in  old 
days  it  was  common  for  churches  to  be  roofed 
with    thatch ;     instances    are    still    to    be 


90 


LIFE    IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 


seen  at  Long  Stanton  and  at  Ickenham,  in 
Suffolk. 

Before  the  Conqueror's  reign  ended,  the 
great  reckoning  was  made  of  all  the  land  and 
property  in  the  country  which  could  pay 
anything  into  the  King's  treasury  :   we  know 


j. 


it  as  Domesday  Book.  The  monk  who  wrote 
the  story  of  Hereward  gives  this  account  of 
it :  "  He  (William)  laid  an  unbearable  tribute 
on  the  English  and  ordered  an  account  of 
the  whole  of  England  in  that  year,  how  much 
land  each  of  his  barons  was  holding,  what 


MEDIAEVAL   CAMBRIDGE  91 

knights  holding  in  fee,  what  hides,  what 
villeins,  what  beasts,  yea,  what  live  cattle 
each  man  possessed  in  his  whole  kingdom 
from  the  greatest  to  the  least,  how  much  each 
taxable  holding  paid ;  and  the  land  was 
vexed  with  many  mischiefs  by  reason  of  these 
doings.  And  terror  and  distress  such  as  were 
not  from  the  beginning  arose  in  all  men's 
minds.  And  in  that  day  all  nature  was  grieved, 
strife  waxed  among  men,  pestilence  among 
beasts,  ruin  and  famine  in  the  land."1 

The  century  after  the  Conquest  must  have 
changed  the  look  of  Cambridge  more  than 
any  later  one.  Besides  the  Castle  and  stone 
Manor  house  the  Normans  reared  several 
other  beautiful  buildings.  The  most  famous 
for  many  years  was  Barnwell  Priory,  and  in 
the  history  of  its  life  we  can  see  a  picture  of 
what  monks  were  doing  all  over  England  at 
this  time. 

Barnwell    Priory 

In  1092,  Hugolina,  the  wife  of  Picot  the  Sheriff, 
lay  grievously  ill.  Her  husband  prayed  with 
her  for  her  recovery,  and  together  they  vowed 

1  Liber  Eliensis,  p.  228. 


92  LIFE    IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

if  she  were  given  health  to  found  a  house  for 
six  Augustine  Canons  and  dedicate  it  to  Saint 
Giles.  In  a  few  days  the  Lady  was  well,  and 
the  vow  was  soon  redeemed,  St.  Giles'  being 
built  just  below  the  Castle  mound  between 
Chesterton  and  Huntingdon  Way. 

But  Robert,  their  son,  when  his  father  died, 
was  accused  of  joining  in  a  plot  to  murder 
King  Henry  I.  ;  so  he  fled  from  the  land,  and 
his  place  and  the  office  of  sheriff  were  given  to 
Pain  Peverel,  who  had  carried  the  standard  of 
Duke  Robert  of  Normandy  on  his  crusade. 
Peverel  wished  to  add  to  the  number  of 
the  Canons,  and  "perceiving  that  the  site 
on  which  their  house  stood  was  not  large 
enough  for  all  the  buildings  needful  to 
his  Canons,  and  was  devoid  of  any  spring 
of  fresh  water,  Pain  Peverel  besought 
King  Henry  to  give  him  a  certain  site 
beyond  the  Borough  of  Cambridge,  extending 
from  the  highway  to  the  river,  and  sufficiently 
agreeable  from  the  pleasantness  of  its  position. 
Besides,  from  the  midst  of  that  site  there 
bubbled  forth  springs  of  clear,  fresh  water, 
called  at  that  time,  in  English,  Barnewelle, 
the  Children's  Springs — because  once  a  year, 


MEDIEVAL   CAMBEIDGE  93 

on  St.  John  Baptist's  Eve,  boys  and  youths 
met  there,  and  amused  themselves  in  the 
English  fashion  with  wrestling  matches  and 
other  games,  and  applauded  each  other  in 
singing  songs  and  playing  on  musical  instru- 
ments. Hence  by  reason  of  the  crowd  of 
boys  and  girls  who  met  and  played  there,  a 
habit  grew  up  that  on  the  same  day  a  crowd 
of  buyers  and  sellers  should  meet  to  do  busi- 
ness. There  too  a  man  of  great  sanctity 
called  Godesone  used  to  lead  a  solitary  life, 
having  a  small  wooden  oratory  that  he  had 
built  in  honour  of  Saint  Andrew.  He  had  died 
a  short  time  before,  leaving  the  place  without 
any  habitation  on  it,  and  his  oratory  without 
a  keeper." 

King  Henry  granted  Peverel  13  acres  of 
land  round  about  the  springs,  and  in  1112  the 
Canons  were  removed  from  St.  Giles  and  a 
new  church  begun  with  "  ponderous  work- 
manship "  in  the  Norman  style.  In  1122 
Pain  died,  and  his  son  "  William  was  not  so 
eager  for  the  building  of  the  church  as  his 
father  had  been,  but  went  to  the  Holy  Land 
and  presently  died  there."1 

1  J.  W.  Clark,  Camb.  Antiquarian  Soc,  Proc.  XXXIII. 


94  LIFE    IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

The  ponderous  Norman  church  was  never 
continued,  but  the  Priors  had  built  a  lighter 
one,  which  was  finished  by  the  5th  Prior  and 
Everard  de  Beche  in  1190  and  consecrated 
to  St.  Giles  and  St.  Andrew,  and  in  the  next 
half  century  the  9th  Prior  "  built  the  f rater 
and  the  farmery,  the  great  guest  hall,  the 
granary,  the  bakehouse  and  brewhouse,  the 
stable  for  horses   (oxen  were  still  used  for 
ploughing,  but  men  travelled  on  horseback), 
the  inner  and  outer  Gatehouse  and  the  walls 
of  the  new  work  .  .  .  almost  to  the  top.    He 
finished  the  chapel  of  St.  Edmund  and  covered 
it  with  lead."     Barnwell  became  one  of  those 
great  church  houses  that  were  centres  of  life 
for  farmers  and  lay  folk,  merchants  as  well 
as   priests.     But   in   the   Middle   Ages   men 
might  not  carry  on  trade  unless  they  had 
received  leave  by  charter  from  their  lords, 
or  could  shew  that  to  do  so  was  an  old  custom. 
The  buying  and  selling  which  had  grown  up 
at  the  Barnewelle  on  Midsummer  Eve  became 
a  great  fair,  but  it  does  not  seem  to  have  been 
formally    licensed    by    the    King    till    John 
reigned,  though  the  canons  had  increased  it 
year  by  year. 


MEDIEVAL  CAMBRIDGE  95 

Another  noble  building  of  Norman  Cam- 
bridge was  the  Round  Church  of  which  we 
still  have  the  nave,  with  its  beautiful  doorway- 
covered  with  (restored)  Norman  mouldings,  and 
its  short  columns  of  workmanship  as  ponderous 
as  Peverel's.  It  was  probably  built  between 
1120  and  1140  by  Ralph  the  Bearded  and  the 
Brothers  of  the  Holy  Sepulchre,  an  order  of 
fighting  monks  like  the  Templars,  whose 
church  in  London  it  resembles  in  plan.  They 
are  both  plainly  the  work  of  men  who  had 
been  to  the  East  and  seen  there  the  church  of 
the  Holy  Sepulchre  after  which  they  are  named. 

Cambridge  was  still  a  tiny  place  when 
Domesday  Book  was  written.  It  contained 
10  wards  but  only  373  dwellings.  On  the 
northern  side  27  houses  had  been  pulled 
down  to  clear  a  site  for  William's  castle. 
Picot  too,  the  Sheriff,  had  made  himself  hated 
by  pulling  down  houses  and  seizing  common 
land  to  build  himself  three  mills,  by  Silver 
Street.  He  added  heavily  to  the  dues,  the 
three  days'  ploughing  became  nine,  and  the 
"  heriot  "x  "  eight  pounds,  a  palfrey,  and  a 

1  Heriot. — A  forced  gift  made  by  the  heir  on  taking  up  his 
father's  lands,  probably  a  survival  of  the  old  practice  of  giving 
stock  with  land. 


96  LIFE   IN   OLD   CAMBRIDGE 

complete  suit  of  knightly  armour."  Besides 
having  to  take  their  corn  to  his  mills  to  be 
ground  the  people  felt  the  Conquest  in  other 
ways.  The  native  English  Thanes  are  not 
spoken  of  in  Domesday;  they  seem  to  have 
died  or  been  made  villeins.  Norman  knights  are 
in  their  places.  William  of  Malmesbury,  the 
chronicler  of  the  Conquest,  laments :  "  Now  is 
England  become  the  home  of  foreigners,  the 
hold  of  strangers  ;  not  one  Englishman  is 
there  now  left  who  is  either  Earl,  Bishop  or 
Abbot;  strangers  be  they  all";  and  this 
seems  truer  of  Cambridgeshire  than  of  other 
parts,  for  the  struggle  of  Hereward's  men  met 
punishment  by  outlawry  and  dispossession. 
Many  of  the  foreign  lords  had  greater  lands 
elsewhere ;  and  it  is  said  that  Cambridgeshire 
"  from  that  day  to  this  has  been  singularly 
lacking  in  '  county  '  families." 

The  growth  of  the  town  may  have  owed 
much  at  this  time  to  the  "  King's  Jews."  The 
Jewry  was  opposite  the  Round  Church  in  the 
angle  of  the  High  Ward  formed  by  Trinity 
Street  and  Sidney  Street.  Jews,  accursed  by 
crusaders  and  scattered  throughout  the  world, 
held  together  then  as  now  like  the  members  of 


MEDIAEVAL   CAMBRIDGE  97 

one  clan,  and  were  always  ready  to  stand  by  one 
another  or  combine  forces  and  funds  in  pursuit 
of  their  trade.  This  unity  and  their  clever- 
ness with  money  made  them  the  bankers  of 
the  Middle  Ages ;  kings  and  other  rulers 
found  them  the  best  agents  for  raising  large 
sums  in  sudden  cases  of  need,  and  took  them 
under  their  special  protection.  Jews  were 
the  only  men  who  had  capital,  and  when 
Henry  I.'s  writ  made  Cambridge  the  one  port 
of  the  county  they  no  doubt  lent  large  sums 
to  the  traders  and  merchants,  and  their 
chambers  would  be  filled  with  their  bonds. 
Englishmen  are  never  ready  to  welcome 
foreigners  and  the  Church  then  taught  them 
to  abhor  Jews  ;  as  money-lenders  and  sharp 
creditors  these  had  a  third  claim  to 
envy  and  malice,  and  the  king's  protection 
must  have  been  often  needed  when  the 
servility  of  the  poor  Jew  or  the  arrogance  of 
the  rich  one  angered  their  burly  English 
debtors  and  neighbours.  Jews  were  the 
King's  servants,  and  it  was  from  the 
King,  Henry  III.,  that  the  burghers  ac- 
quired the  house  of  a  rich  Jew,  called 
Benjamin,    for    a    town   gaol.       Jews    were 


98  LIFE    IN   OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

among  the  first  to  build  stone  houses  in 
England. 

The  life  of  Cambridge  was  further  enriched 
in  Henry  the  First's  reign  by  the  founding 
of  the  Nunnery  of  St.  Mary  and  St.  Rhadegund. 
This  was  at  first  a  little  cell  by  the  riverside 
where  a  handful  of  devout  women  took  refuge 
from  the  world  about  1133,  just  before  the 
troublous  times  of  Stephen.  Almost  at  the 
same  date  the  Hospital  of  St.  John  was  built 
by  Henry  Frost,  a  burgess,  for  a  Master  and 
Brethren  of  the  Augustine  Order  to  care  for 
the  sick  and  poor  townsmen.  The  old  hospital 
has  given  place  to  St.  John's  College,  where 
its  foundations  are  still  to  be  seen,  and  in 
Jesus  College  part  of  St.  Rhadegund's  Church 
and  Nunnery  remain  to  form  what  some  think 
the  most  interesting  of  all  college  chapels. 
King  Stephen  granted  to  the  nuns  the  right 
to  hold  a  fair  in  the  town,  and  it  soon  got  the 
name  of  Garlic  Fair. 

In  the  Jewry  and  opposite  Jesus  Lane  stood 
the  church  of  All  Saints,  while  a  second,  "All 
Saints  by  the  Castle,"  stood  across  the  river 
till  at  the  time  of  the  Black  Death  it  was 
deserted,  became  ruinous,  and  the  haunt  of 


MEDIEVAL   CAMBRIDGE  99 

wild  beasts.  On  the  north  of  the  bridge,  too, 
were  the  Norman  churches  of  St.  Giles  and 
St.  Peter.  Two  ancient  arches  have  been 
kept  in  St.  Giles,  one  of  them  the  Norman 
chancel  arch  blessed  by  the  great  and  meek 
St.  Anselm,  and  a  Norman  font  is  in  St.  Peter's. 
These  would  be  the  churches  that  suffered 
at  the  hands  of  a  brigand  baron  in  Stephen's 
reign,  who  posed  as  a  friend  of  Matilda,  and 
against  whom  Stephen  built  a  stronghold  at 
Burwell,  of  which  only  the  foundations  can 
now  be  seen.  This  Galfrid  de  Mandeville 
raided  the  countryside,  sacking  Cambridge, 
and  "  not  sparing  even  the  churches."  He 
was  shot  through  the  head  when  attacking  the 
fort  of  Burwell,  and  died  "  excommunicate 
and  unabsolved,  nor  was  the  earth  suffered 
to  give  a  grave  to  the  sacrilegious  offender."1 

1  Conybeare,  Cambridgeshire,  p.  111. 


Chapter  VIII. 

Monks   and   Friars 

In  Cambridge  of  the  Middle  Ages  three  main 
streets  led  south  and  east.  Bridge  Street 
linked  Huntingdon  Road  with  the  main  road 
to  Colchester,  known  as  Hadstock  Way,  with 
Barnwell  Gate  where  the  Post  Office  now 
stands.  Westwards  from  Bridge  Street  one 
might  turn  aside  at  the  Jewry  into  High  Ward 
to  reach  Trumpington  Gate ;  while  nearer 
still  to  the  river  ran  Milne  Street  serving  the 
Sheriff's  and  King's  mills,  and  traceable  now 
in  the  lanes  on  which  Trinity  Hall  and  Queens' 
College  open.  Beyond  the  Gates  were  the 
common  fields  of  the  southern  town,  which 
was  fortified  by  a  moat  or  watercourse, 
always  known  as  The  King's  Ditch,  for  all 
waters  not  private  were  the  King's.  Starting 
from  the  King's  Mill  in  Mill  Lane  it  ran  by 
way  of  Pembroke  Street  and  St.  Andrew's 
Street  to  Christ's,  and  so  to  Park  Street 
and  into  the  river  opposite  Magdalene.  It 
took  the  place  of  the  walls  which  surrounded 


102  LIFE    IN   OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

most  mediaeval  towns.  Outside  Trumpington 
Gate  was  the  village  of  Little  St.  Mary,  and 
beyond  it,  where  Downing  College  now  is,  the 
common  arable  "  St.  Thomas'  Leas  "  and  the 
common  pasture  of  Coe  Fen.  Beyond  the 
King's  Ditch,  which  crossed  Jesus  Lane, 
Maid's  Causeway  ran  out  between  meadow 
and  ploughland  to  Barnwell  Priory. 

The  following  extracts  from  the  book  of  the 
rules  of  the  monastery  give  a  good  idea  of  the 
life  and  duties  of  these  Canons.  It  was 
written  in  1295  or  1296,  nearly  200  years  after 
the  foundation  of  the  house,  and  the  rules 
would  continue  in  force  until  Henry  VIII. 
dissolved  it. 

CUSTOMS  OF  AUGUSTINIAN 
CANONS   OF  BARNWELL  PRIORY.1 
4.     The  road  of  Canons  Regular  is  the  rule  of  blessed 
Augustine,  Bishop  of  Hippo. 

6.    OF  THE  REVERENCE  DUE  TO  THE  PRELATE. 

.  .  .  in  the  first  chapter  that  he  shall  hold  .  .  .  all  officers 
are  to  prostrate  themselves  before  him  and  lay  their 
keys  at  his  feet.  ...  In  whatever  place  he  passes  before 
them  they  ought  to  rise  and  bow,  and  remain  standing. 
.  .  .  Whoever  brings  him  a  book,  or  anything  else,  ought 

1  Customs  of  Aug.  Canons,  J.  W.  Clark,  1897,  Macmillan  and 
Bowes.  Liber  Memorandorum  Ecclasiae,  de  Bernewelle, 
Book  viii,  Consuetudinarium. 


MONKS   AND   FRIARS  103 

to  bow.  ...  To  him  alone  is  entrusted  the  decision  as 
to  punishment  of  more  serious  offences.  .  .  .  When 
he  is  present  no  brother  should  leave  the  precinct 
of  the  monastery  without  his  permission.  Within 
the  precinct  brethren  who  go  either  to  the  granges, 
the  tailor-house,  the  garden,  or  the  other  offices,  though 
they  have  received  permission  from  the  Sub-Prior,  should 
bow  to  the  Prelate,  if  he  come  in,  and  ask  leave  of  him, 
and  intimate  to  him  the  permission  they  had  previously 
obtained. 

7.  The  Prelate  ought  to  be  careful  that  ...  he 
neither  abuse  the  high  office  he  has  undertaken  .  . 
nor  be  lukewarm  or  remiss.  .  .  .  For  he  ought  not  to 
have  honour  without  trouble.  .  .  .  He  ought  to  sleep 
with  the  rest  in  the  Dorter,  to  eat  with  them  in 
the  Frater  ...  to  make  his  round  within  and  without 
the  offices  ;  for  who  will  then  find  him  to  be  idle  ?  .  .  . 
On  all  double  feasts  ...  he  says  first  and  second 
Evensong,  Mattins  and  High  Mass.  .  .  .  the  Prelate 
ought  not  to  ring  the  bell ;  or  even  give  the  signal  in  the 
Dorter  to  wake  the  brethren.  He  must  by  no  means 
presume,  without  the  advice  and  consent  of  the  Chapter, 
to  sell  or  exchange,  to  give  or  alienate,  church  property  as 
lands,  tenements  ;  to  expel  a  brother  from  the  monastery ; 
to  receive  back  one  who  has  been  expelled  ;  to  admit  a 
novice  or  a  lay-brother  ;  or  to  present  incumbents  to 
vacant  churches  or  vicarages. 

10.  Op  the  Provost  who  is  called  Sub-Prior. 
,  .  .  when  the  Prelate  is  absent,  or  even  when  he  is 
present,  the  Sub-Prior  acts  as  his  subordinate.  .  .  . 
It  is  .  .  .  his  duty  ...  to  make  his  round,  in  order 
that  he  may  restrain  those  who  are  walking  to  and  fro  ; 


104  LIFE    IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

and  those  behaving  in  an  unseemly  manner.  He  should 
specially  do  this  after  Compline,  when  silence  will  be 
most  complete,  and  no  one  is  allowed  to  leave  the  Dorter. 
Then,  if  it  be  winter-time,  he  is  to  light  a  lantern,  and 
visit  different  offices  round  the  Cloister,  and  the  Farmery 
also,  because  at  that  time  neither  those  who  have  been 
bled,  nor  those  who  are  infirm  ought  to  remain  there, 
but  only  the  sick  who  are  lying  there  in  bed.  He  ought  also 
to  shut  the  doors  round  the  Cloister,  to  exclude  all 
secular  persons,  to  take  the  keys  with  him,  and 
deposit  them  in  the  Dorter,  and  so  at  length  sleep  with 
the  Convent.  .  .  . 

11.  .  .  .  the  Prelate  ought  not  either  to  appoint  or 
to  depose  the  Sub-Prior  without  the  advice  of  the 
spiritual  brethren,  nor  except  in  hearing  of  the  Chapter. 

13.  The  Precentor,  who  is  also  called  Librarian  .  .  . 
has  charge  of  the  books  ...  it  is  part  of  his  duty  to 
rule  the  Quire.  ...  let  no  one  set  their  opinion  above 
his  ;  and  let  no  one  disturb  what  he  has  begun  by 
beginning  anything  else,  or  by  beginning  in  any  other  way. 

14.  Of  the  safe  keeping  of  the  books. 

The  Librarian  .  .  .  is  to  take  charge  of  the  books  of  the 
Church  ;  all  which  he  ought  to  keep,  and  to  know  under 
their  separate  titles  ;  and  he  should  frequently  examine 
them  carefully  to  prevent  any  damage  or  injury  from 
insects  or  decay  ...  he  has  to  provide  the  writers  with 
parchment,  ink  and  everything  else  necessary  for 
writing  ;  and  personally  to  hire  those  who  write  for 
money.  .  .  . 

The  press  in  which  the  books  are  kept  ought  to  be 
lined  inside  with  wood,  that  the  damp  of  the  walls  may 
not  moisten  or  stain  books.  .  .  . 


MONKS   AND    FRIARS  105 

Further,  as  books  ought  to  be  mended,  printed  and 
taken  care  of  by  the  Librarian,  so  ought  they  to  be 
properly  bound  by  him. 

15.  Of  the  office  of  the  Sacrist. 

18.  Of  rising  for  Mattins. 

Brethren  ought  to  rise  for  Mattins  at  midnight.  Hence 
the  Sub-Sacrist,  whose  duty  it  is  to  regulate  the  clock, 
ought  before  then  to  ring  the  little  bell  in  the  Dorter  to 
awaken  the  Convent.  .  .  .  Next,  when  the  lantern  has 
been  lighted,  which  one  of  the  younger  brethren  ought 
to  carry  in  front  of  them,  and  a  gentle  signal  has  been 
given,  they  should  put  on  their  shoes  and  their  girdles, 
march  into  Church  in  procession,  and  devoutly  and 
reverently  begin  the  triple  prayer,  six  at  a  time. 

20.  At  daybreak,  at  a  signal  from  the  Warden  of  the 
Order,  all  the  brethren  ought  to  rise.  No  one  ought  to 
remain  in  bed  any  longer  without  a  very  reasonable 
excuse.  When  they  leave  the  Dorter,  after  washing 
their  hands  and  combing  their  hair,  they  ought  to  go  to 
the  Church  before  they  turn  aside  to  any  other  place.  .  .  . 
After  this,  while  the  priests  are  preparing  themselves  for 
private  masses,  let  some  attend  to  the  duties  assigned 
to  them,  others  take  their  books  and  go  into  the  cloister, 
and  there  read  or  sing  in  an  undertone. 

Of  Novices. 

25.  ...  let  the  master  teach  him  how  to  keep  guard 
over  his  eyes.  After  this  let  him  lead  the  Novice  into  the 
Quire,  and  there  let  him  say  the  Lord's  Prayer  three 
times  on  his  knees,  with  as  many  salutations  of  the 
Blessed  Virgin.  Then  let  his  master  lead  him  to  his  bed 
in  the  Dorter,  and  there,  if  it  be  needful,  let  him  receive 


106  LIFE   IN    OLD   CAMBRIDGE 

his  tunic  and  girdle,  and  utter  his  private  prayers. 
Then,  returning  with  his  master  into  the  Cloister,  or 
rather  the  Chamber,  let  him  be  taught  how  to  behave  at 
the  whole  Mass,  always  guarding  his  eyes.  After  Mass 
let  him  be  taught  how  he  ought  to  behave  at  meals,  at 
grace  before  and  after,  and  at  the  noontide  repose  if  it 
ought  to  be  held,  and  at  Nones.  Then  let  him  be  taught 
how  he  ought  to  behave  at  Evensong,  at  Supper,  at 
Collation,  at  Compline,  and  at  the  triple  prayer  ;  and 
how,  after  receiving  the  holy  water,  he  should  cover  his 
head  and  pass  through  the  Cloister  to  the  Dorter,  and 
how  he  is  to  take  off  his  shoes  under  his  habit.  .  .  . 
Next  his  master  is  to  be  at  his  side  when  he  goes  to  bed, 
and  shew  him  how  to  arrange  his  habit  round  about 
him.  When  it  is  time  to  get  up  for  Mattins,  the  Master 
is  to  come  to  the  novice,  and  help  him  with  his  clothes 
and  shoes,  and  make  him  sit  before  his  bed,  with  his  head 
concealed  in  the  depths  of  his  hood.  There  he  is  to  sit 
and  wait  for  the  ringing,  and  go  with  the  convent  into 
the  Church,  and,  when  Mattins  are  over,  return  with  the 
Convent  to  his  bed  in  the  Dorter.  .  .  .  Let  him  honour 
his  seniors.  Let  him  learn  the  signs  for  the  avoidance  of 
too  much  talking.  Let  him  speak  in  gentle,  not  in 
clamorous  tones  ;  let  his  gait  be  devout,  not  hurried  ; 
let  him  be  pleasant  with  everybody. 

28.  Of  Silence. 

Silence  is  to  be  kept  according  to  the  Rule  (of  St.  Augus- 
tine) in  the  Church,  the  Dorter,  the  Cloister,  and  the 
Frater  ;  but  it  may  be  broken  in  the  event  of  four 
accidents,  namely  :  robbers  or  thieves  ;  sickness  ;  fire 
and  workmen.    Moreover,  it  may  be  broken  for  the  sake 


MONKS   AND    FRIARS  107 

of  a  King  or  Princess,  an  Archbishop  or  a  Bishop.  .  .  . 
Silence  is  to  be  kept  in  the  Cloister  from  morning  till 
after  Chapter  ;  but  after  Chapter,  if  no  Hour  follow 
immediately,  the  brethren  may  have  leave  in  each  day  for 
talking  in  the  Cloister,  which  may  last  until  the  ringing 
of  the  Hour  (Service)  preceding  High  Mass.  .  .  . 

29.  Of  the  Chapter. 

The  Chapter-House  is  a  place  for  confession,  necessary 
to  the  soul,  but  hateful  to  devils.  As  brethren  sin  daily, 
they  ought  to  come  daily  to  the  Chapter-House,  that  they 
may  there  amend  their  daily  faults.  .  .  .  No  one  ought 
to  offer  any  defence  of  an  accused  brother,  or  even  to 
speak  unless  called  upon.  .  .  . 

A  matter  that  has  been  once  settled  by  the  Chapter 
ought  not  to  be  again  unsettled  without  the  consent  of 
the  Chapter. 

30.  Of  Processions. 

All  the  brethren  ought  to  assemble  for  all  the  processions 
on  Sundays,  and  other  solemn  processions.  All  those 
who  have  been  bled,  all  the  officers,  and  even  the  infirm 
or  feeble,  who  can  be  present  without  danger,  ought  to 
come  to  the  blessing  of  water  and  to  the  procession.  .  .  . 
In  the  Sunday  procession  round  the  Cloister  the  bearer 
of  the  holy  water  ought  always  to  go  first  ;  next  those 
who  carry  the  cross  and  the  tapers  ;  next  after  them  the 
Sub -Deacon  with  the  book  ;  the  Deacon  next  after  him  ; 
lastly,  the  Priest.  The  Convent,  the  juniors  at  their 
head,  are  to  follow  at  a  slow  pace  ;  the  Prelate,  turning 
neither  to  the  right  nor  to  the  left,  but  walking  in  the 
middle  of  the  path,  will  be  the  last  in  the  procession. 
On  all  Wednesdays  and  Fridays  throughout  Lent, 


108  LIFE    IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

the  convent  ought  to  walk  round  the  Cloister  without 
shoes. 

31.  Of  the  Fraterer. 

It  is  the  duty  of  the  Fraterer  to  lay  the  table-cloths  .  .  . 
to  set  clean  salt  on  each  table  in  clean  salt-cellars,  and 
if  it  should  have  got  damp,  to  serve  it  out  for  use  in  the 
kitchen,  dry  and  wipe  out  with  a  cloth  the  damp  salt- 
cellars, and  so  set  on  clean  salt.  .  .  .  He  ought  also  to 
fetch  bread  for  the  use  of  the  brethren  from  the  cellar, 
and  to  be  careful  that  the  bread  is  clean  and  not  burnt, 
nor  gnawed  by  mice,  nor  dirty.  .  .  .  The  jugs  ought  to 
be  washed  inside  and  out  once  a  week  ;  and  the  Frater 
ought  to  be  cleaned  thoroughly  with  besoms  as  often  as  it 
requires  it.  The  Almoner  will  provide  baskets  and 
besoms  for  collecting  the  remnants  of  the  table.  .  .  . 

The  Fraterer  ought  also  to  provide  mats  and  rushes  to 
strew  the  Frater  and  the  alleys  of  the  Cloister  at  the 
Frater  door,  and  frequently  to  renew  them  ;  in  summer 
to  throw  flowers,  mint  and  fennel  into  the  air  to  make 
a  sweet  odour  ;  in  summer  to  provide  fans.  When  cups 
and  spoons  are  broken  he  is  to  get  them  mended,  and 
he  is  to  count  them  every  day  to  see  that  none  are 
missing,  and  at  night  to  lay  them  up  in  a  safe  place. 

32.  In  the  Frater. 

While  the  brethren  are  sitting  at  table  .  .  .  they 
ought  to  speak  sparingly,  and  not  to  let  their  eyes 
wander.  .  .  .  No  one  is  allowed  to  exchange  fish  for 
meat ;  no  one  may  whittle,  or  write,  or  look  at  a  book 
...  no  one  may  rise  from  table  or  leave  the  room,  or 
fetch  anything  for  himself  from  the  hatch.  No  one  may 
come  in  after  the  second  dish  has  been  set  on  the  table. 


MONKS   AND    FRIARS  109 

...  If  both  dishes,  or  one  of  them,  be  found  to  be 
spotted  with  dirt,  let  an  alternative  be  provided. 

The  servitors  are  to  serve  the  food  quickly  and 
actively,  not  running  or  jumping  in  an  unbecoming 
fashion,  and  they  are  to  hold  the  dishes  neither  too  high 
nor  too  low,  but  so  that  the  food  may  be  seen  by  him 
who  carries  it.  The  dishes  are  not  to  be  broken,  or  dirty, 
or  unsuitable,  or  smeared  on  the  under  side.  The 
servitor  should  use  both  hands,  and  carry  only  a  single 
dish,  except  when  he  is  serving  eggs.  If  he  cannot  bring 
the  brethren  all  they  ask  for,  he  ought,  nevertheless,  to 
reply  to  them  civilly.  .  .  .  There  is  to  be  no  talking  at 
the  kitchen-hatch,  because  the  noise  might  be  heard  by 
the  brethren. 

33.  The  Dorter. 

A  brother  may  enter  the  Dorter  as  often  as  he  has  need 
to  do  so,  but  he  ought  not  to  linger  there  unless  he  wish 
to  change  his  sheets  or  to  make  his  bed. 

34.  Respect  due  to  the  Convent. 

When  the  Convent  is  talking  no  secular  ought  to  come 
near  nor  even  to  stand  at  a  distance  listening  and  looking 
towards  them. 

Should  the  Convent  go  beyond  the  precincts  in  pro- 
cession, they  ought  to  be  preceded  by  cross,  candles,  and 
so  forth  ;  and  their  freemen  ought  to  turn  out  of  their 
path  any  horses  and  carts  advancing  in  an  opposite 
direction,  in  order  to  prevent  them  passing  through  the 
midst  of  the  Convent,  or  to  stop  them  until  the  Convent 
have  passed  by. 

35.  Or  the  Almoner  and  his  kindness. 

The  Almoner  ought  to  be  kind,  compassionate  and  God- 
fearing.    He  ought  also  to  be  discreet  and  careful  in 


110  LIFE   IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

making  his  apportionments.  He  ought  to  endow  with  a 
more  copious  largess  pilgrims,  palmers,  chaplains, 
beggars,  lepers.  Old  men  and  those  who  are  decrepit, 
and  lame,  and  blind,  or  who  are  confined  to  their  beds, 
he  ought  frequently  to  visit,  and  give  them  suitable 
relief. 

40.  Of  the  Grainger  and  of  the  Receivers. 
All  the  property  of  the  monastery,  both  in  corn  and  in 
money  .  .  .  passes  through  the  hands  of  the  Grainger 
and  the  Receivers.  Whatever  belongs  to  bread  and 
beer,  to  seed  or  allowance,  ought  to  come  out  of  the 
granary ;  whatever  belongs  to  money  ought  to  be 
handed  out  of  the  treasury  by  the  hands  of  the  Receivers. 

The  Grainger  ought  ...  to  set  down  on  tallies  all  the 
profits  of  the  manors,  and  to  write  out  tallies  of  each.  .  .  . 
The  Receivers  ought  to  do  the  same  by  help  of  tallies 
and  rolls,  and  when  the  Prelate  chooses,  lay  a  final 
account  before  the  Convent. 

41.  Of  the  Hosteller. 

...  it  becomes  him  to  have  not  merely  facility  of 
expression,  but  also  elegant  manners  and  a  respectable 
bringing  up  .  .  .  for  friends  are  multiplied  by  agreeable 
words.  .  .  perfect  cleanliness  and  propriety  should  be 
found  in  his  department,  namely,  to  keep  clean  cloths 
and  clean  towels  ;  cups  without  flaws  ;  spoons  of  silver  ; 
mattresses,  blankets,  sheets  not  merely  clean  but 
untorn  ;  proper  pillows  ;  quilts  to  cover  the  beds  of 
full  width  and  length  and  pleasing  to  the  eyes  of  those 
who  enter  the  room  ;  a  proper  laver  of  metal ;  a  basin 
clean  both  inside  and  out ;  in  winter  a  candle  and 
candlesticks  ;  fire  that  does  not  smoke ;  writing  materials, 


MONKS    AND    FRIAftS  111 

clean  salt  .  .  .  the  whole  Guest-house  kept  clear  of 
spiders-webs  and  dirt,  and  strewn  with  rushes  under- 
foot ;  .  .  .  a  sufficient  quantity  of  straw  in  the  beds  ; 
keys  and  locks  to  the  doors,  and  good  bolts  on  the 
inside,  so  as  to  keep  the  doors  securely  closed  while  the 
guests  are  asleep. 

42.  Of  the  Chamberlain. 

It  is  the  chief  duty  of  the  Chamberlain  to  provide  warm 
water  for  the  shaving  of  the  Convent,  and  soap  for 
washing  their  heads.  He  is  to  provide  soap  for  the  baths 
of  the  brethren,  if  it  be  asked  for. 

The  Chamberlain  ought  to  provide  a  laundress  of  good 
character  and  good  reputation  to  wash  the  garments  of 
the  Convent.  She  must  be  able  properly  to  mend  and 
wash  all  the  linen  of  the  brethren,  namely,  surplices, 
rochets,  sheets,  shirts  and  drawers.  The  linen  ought  to 
be  washed  once  a  fortnight  in  summer  and  once  in  three 
weeks  in  winter. 

44.        Or  the  Master  of  the  Farmery. 

The  Master  of  the  Farmery  .  .  .  who  ought  to  have  the 
care  of  the  sick,  ought  to  be  gentle,  good  tempered,  kind, 
compassionate  to  the  sick,  and  willing  to  gratify  their 
needs  with  affectionate  sympathy.  It  should  rarely  or 
never  happen  that  he  has  not  ginger,  cinnamon,  peony, 
and  the  like,  ready  in  his  cupboard.  .  .  . 

No  secular  ought  to  enter  the  Farmery  .  .  .  women 
never.  Physicians,  however,  may  enter,  and  take  their 
meals  with  the  sick  if  they  have  obtained  leave. 

The  Master  of  the  Farmery  ought  frequently  to  .  .  . 
ask  them,  with  kindly  interest,  whether  they  wish  for 
anything.  .  .  .  Further,  he  should  provide  ...  a  fire 


112  LIFE   IN   OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

on  the  hearth,  should  the  state  of  the  weather  require  it, 
a  candle,  a  cresset,  and  a  lamp  to  burn  all  night ;  and 
everything  that  is  necessary,  useful  and  proper. 

52.  Of  Lay -brethren. 

Lay-brethren  are  not  to  be  admitted  to  the  habit,  unless 
they  are  instructed  in  some  craft  which  is  useful  to  the 
monastery  ;  for,  as  regular  Canons  ought  to  be  occupied 
day  and  night  in  things  spiritual,  so  lay-brethren  ought 
to  labour  for  the  profit  of  the  Church  in  things  corporeal ; 
for  in  a  monastery  no  one  ought  to  eat  his  bread  unless 
he  work  for  it. 

Of  the  Chapter  (from  Customs  of  St.  Victor). 

He  who  makes  an  accusation  is  first  to  say  :  "  I  accuse 
such  or  such  a  brother."  The  accused  .  .  is  to  answer 
nothing  from  his  place,  but  to  come  in  front  of  the  Abbot, 
to  bend  the  knee,  and  then,  standing  upright,  to  await 
patiently  .  .  .  if  he  is  not  conscious  of  it  he  is  to  say 
briefly  ..."  My  lord,  I  do  not  remember  that  I  did  or 
said  what  my  brother  mentions."  Then  his  accuser  may 
not  repeat  his  accusation,  and  the  accused,  if  the  Abbot 
so  direct,  may  go  and  sit  down.  .  .  .  When  anybody 
has  to  receive  discipline,  he  is  to  rise  to  his  knees  and 
modestly  divest  himself  of  his  garments.  Then,  bending 
forward,  he  is  to  remain  covered  with  the  same  garments 
from  his  girdle  downwards,  and  as  he  lies  there  he  is  either 
to  be  completely  silent  or  to  say  merely  :  "  It  is  my  fault, 
and  I  will  amend  myself."  Meanwhile  no  other  brother 
is  to  speak  unless  one  of  the  Priors  should  humbly  inter- 
cede for  him  ;  and  he  who  flogs  him  is  not  to  cease  from 
flogging  till  the  Abbot  bids  him.  When  he  has  ceased, 
he  is  to  help  the  brother  to  put  on  his  clothes  ;    who. 


MONKS   AND   FRIARS  113 

clothed  and  standing  upright,  is  not  to  stir  till  the  Abbot 
says  :  "  Go  and  sit  down."  Then  he  is  to  bow,  and  go  to 
his  place. 

Ely  had  long  been  another  of  these  great 
houses.  Since  Here  ward's  day  Normans  from 
1081  to  1199  were  building  its  magnificent 
cathedral,  and  in  Ely,  Barnwell  and  Cambridge 
had  a  keen  rival.  Ely  was  a  centre  for 
pilgrimage  and  the  first  good  harbour  for 
incoming  ships,  but  Cambridge  at  the  Con- 
quest became  the  seat  of  the  King's  Sheriff 
who  had  to  gather  his  dues  from  towns  and 
traders.  When  men  might  trade  at  Soham  or 
Reach,  Bottisham  or  Ely,  just  as  they  chose,  it 
would  be  hard  for  the  Sheriff's  men  to  make 
sure  that  no  little  boats  escaped  them,  and  the 
King's  dues  must  often  have  gone  unpaid. 
This,  rather  than  care  for  the  welfare  of  Cam- 
bridge, probably  caused  Henry  I.  to  issue  a 
writ  addressed  to  all  great  people  who  might 
raise  claims  to  levy  dues  in  any  part  of  the 
county.     It  runs : — 

"  Henry,  King  of  the  English  to  Hervey, 
Bishop  of  Ely,  and  all  his  Barons  of  Cam- 
bridgeshire, Greeting  :  I  forbid  that  any  boat 
shall  ply  at  any  hithe  in  Cambridgeshire,  save 


114 


LIFE    IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 


at  the  hithe  of  my  borough  of  Cambridge, 
nor  shall  barges  be  laden  save  in  the  borough 
of  Cambridge,  nor  shall  any  take  toll  else- 
where but  only  there  ;  and  whosoever  shall 
do  forfeit  in  the  borough,  let  him  there  do 


planot 

Ckrobr 
Castle. 

right ;  but  if  any  do  otherwise,  I  command 
that  he  be  at  right  thereof  before  my  justice 
when  I  command  that  there  be  plea  thereof. 
As  witnesses  :  the  Chancellor  and  Miles  of 
Gloucester  and  Richard  Basset  at  London."1 

1   See  Cambridge  Borough  Charters. — Bateson. 


MONKS   AND   FRIARS  115 

The  effect  of  this  writ  must  have  been  to 
decide  the  rivalry  in  favour  of  Cambridge  by 
drawing  all  the  shipping  away  from  Ely : 
perhaps  it  was  now  that  the  wares  at  St. 
Awdry's  Fair  became  "  tawdry,"  being  re- 
duced to  such  light  trifles  as  could  be  carried 
overland,  while  the  heavy  goods  went  up  by 
barge  to  the  hithes  that  lined  the  banks  of 
the  Cam  above  and  below  Magdalene  Bridge. 
Cambridge  became  in  practice  a  Staple  town, 
the  only  channel  of  trade  for  the  countryside, 
and  the  burgesses  waxed  fat  accordingly. 
Soon  they  began  to  try  to  shake  off  the  hand 
of  the  Sheriff  in  money  matters.  The  way 
to  do  this,  which  was  becoming  usual  since 
London  had  set  the  example  in  1100,  was  to 
get  leave  from  the  King  to  "  farm  "  x  the  dues 
which  the  town  had  to  pay  to  him.  Such 
dues  were  the  "  haw  gavel,"  a  small  rent  on 
each  house,  the  "  land  gavel,"  a  rent  on  the 
strips  of  the  plough  land,  a  payment  for  the 
right  to  have  a  market  and  the  tolls  which 
were  taken  there,  the  fees  paid  by  men  who 
had  to  go  to  the  King's  court  for  justice,  pay- 

1  To  farm  the  taxes  was  to  have  the  right  of  collecting  all 
dues  from  the  burghers  on  condition  of  paying  a  fixed  round 
sum  yearly  to  the  king;  as  publicans  did  in  Palestine  to  Caesar. 


116  LIFE    IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

ments  to  the  King's  miller  for  grinding  corn  in 
his  mill,  and  so  on.  These  three  last  might  vary- 
very  much  from  year  to  year ;  if,  instead  of 
them,  a  lump  sum  of  a  fixed  amount  were 
to  be  paid  year  by  year,  both  parties  might 
gain.  The  king  would  be  certain  what  revenue 
he  could  expect;  and  if  the  tolls,  etc.,  increased, 
the  town  would  reap  the  benefit  by  collecting 
them  themselves.  Thus  somewhere  between 
1161  and  1189  the  men  of  Cambridge  must 
have  asked  for  this  privilege,  for  there  is  a 
charter  from  Henry  II.  granting  the  town 
the  ridit  to  "  farm  "  the  dues  : — 

"  Henry  by  the  grace  of  God  King  of 
England  and  Duke  of  Normandy  and  Aqui- 
taine  and  Count  of  Anjou,  to  his  Justices, 
Sheriffs,  and  all  his  Ministers  and  faithful 
people  Greeting.  Know  ye  that  I  have 
delivered  at  farm  to  my  burgesses  of  Cam- 
bridge, my  town  of  Cambridge  to  be  holden 
of  me  in  chief  by  the  same  farm  which  my 
Sheriffs  were  wont  to  render  to  me,  and  so 
that  they  themselves  do  answer  therefor  at 
my  exchequer.  And  therefore  I  command 
that  ye  guard  and  maintain  the  said  bur- 
gesses and  all  things  to  them  belonging  as 


MONKS    AND    FRIARS 


117 


though  they  were  mine  own,  so  that  no  one 
may  in  any  wise  cause  to  them  injury  or 
damage  or  grievance.  For  I  will  not  that 
they  answer  therefor  to  any  but  to  me  and 
at  my  Exchequer.  As  Witness  :  Roger  the 
son  of  Reinfrid  at  Qu6villy."  x 


Vim)  o^  Carntaidge  Capita,  froniaij  atjcltqt  dmwog,  supposed 
to  have 'Wen  drau>n  about  t^e  rcum  of  Qiuet)  EUisijellj. 

This  charter  marks  in  a  sense  the  beginning 
of  the  self-governing  life  of  the  town.  Hence- 
forth it  is  a  tenant  in  chief  of  the  king  ;  the 
Sheriff,  while  he  still  held  the  King's  court  in 
the  borough  had  no  longer  any  excuse  for 

1  The  King  was  this  year  in  Normandy;  his  hunting  seat  was 
at  Qu6villy. 


118  LIFE   IN   OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

meddling  with  its  trade  or  making  any  exac- 
tions on  the  burgesses.  It  is  quite  in  keeping 
with  Henry  II.  's  treatment  of  his  sheriffs, 
whose  power  he  sternly  checked.  Before  his 
reign  they  were  usually  local  men  and  used 
their  local  influence  to  make  themselves 
almost  strong  enough  to  defy  the  King,  often 
too  their  sons  succeeded  them.  To  prevent 
this  Henry  in  1167  had  removed  every  sheriff 
in  England  from  his  office,  replacing  only  the 
upright  among  them,  and  sending  even  those 
to  fresh  counties. 

It  is  to  be  noted  that  this  charter  does  not 
give  the  right  for  good,  but  only  for  the  king's 
reign,  unless  it  were  renewed.  The  final 
grant  or  "  fee  farm  "  was  given  by  King  John. 

Thus  the  most  opposite  interests,  those  of 
the  King,  the  Prior  and  Nun,  the  down- 
trodden Shylock  of  the  Jewry,  the  worldly- 
minded,  comfortable  burgher,  and  the  grasp- 
ing Norman  noble,  all  played  their  part  in 
developing  the  wealth  and  fame  of  the  new 
royal  port  of  Cambridge. 

Hitherto  history  has  rarely  recorded  the 
life  of  the  people,  but  now  and  then  when 
some  king  moves  across  the  stage  "  the  light 


MONKS   AND    FRIARS  119 

that  beats  upon  a  throne  "  throws  the  hum- 
bler, attendant  figures  into  relief. 

King  John  is  such  an  one.  In  the  second 
year  of  his  reign  he  granted  a  charter  which 
confirmed  the  old  rights  and  gave  important 
new  ones  to  the  townsmen  : — 

I.  That  they  should  have  a  gild  of  merchants  [a  most 
important  right  which  was  often  the  beginning  of  self- 
government]. 

II.  That  no  burgess  should  plead  without  the  walls 
of  the  borough  of  any  plea,  save  pleas  of  exterior  tenure 
(except  the  King's  moneyers  and  servants). 

III.  That  no  burgess  should  make  duel  ;  [i.e.  trial  by 
battle]  and  that  with  regard  to  pleas  of  the  Crown  the 
burgesses  might  defend  themselves  according  to  the 
ancient  custom  of  the  borough.  [Probably  by  bringing 
a  certain  number  of  neighbours  to  swear  to  their  up- 
rightness.] 

IV.  That  all  burgesses  of  the  merchants'  gild  should 
be  free  of  toll,  passage,  lastage,  pontage,  and  stallage  in 
the  fair,  and  without,  and  throughout  the  ports  of  the 
English  Sea,  and  in  all  the  King's  lands  on  this  side  of  the 
sea,  and  beyond  the  sea  (saving  in  all  things  the  liberties 
of  the  City  of  London).  [Toll  =  a  payment  to  the 
King ;  passage  =  pajmient  made  bjT  a  passenger ; 
lastage  =  payment  on  every  load  passing  ;  pontage  = 
payment  for  crossing  bridge ;  stallage  =  paj-ment 
for  right  to  erect  a  booth  to  sell  goods.] 

V.  That  no  burgess  should  be  judged  to  be  in  mercy 
as  to  his  money,  except  according  to  the  ancient  law  of 


120  LIFE    IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

the  borough  which  they  had  in  the  time  of  the  King's 
ancestors.     [To  be  in  mercy  —  to  be  liable  to  fine.] 

VI.  That  the  burgesses  should  have  justly  all  their 
lands  and  tenures,  wages,  and  debts,  whosoever  may  owe 
the  same,  and  that  right  should  be  done  to  them  of  their 
lands  and  tenures  within  the  borough,  according  to  the 
custom  thereof. 

VII.  That  of  all  the  debts  of  burgesses  that  should 
be  contracted  at  Cambridge  and  of  the  pledges  there 
made,  the  pleas  should  be  holden  at  Cambridge. 

VIII.  That  if  anyone  in  all  the  King's  dominions 
should  take  toll  or  custom  of  the  men  of  Cambridge  of  the 
merchants'  gild,  and  should  not  make  satisfaction,  the 
Sheriff  of  Cambridgeshire,  or  the  Reeve  of  Cambridge 
should  take  therefor  a  distress  at  Cambridge  (saving  in  all 
things  the  liberties  of  the  City  of  London). 

IX.  That  for  the  amendment  [upkeep]  of  the  borough, 
the  burgesses  should  have  a  fair  in  Rogation  Week,  with 
all  its  liberties  as  they  were  accustomed  to  have. 

X.  That  all  the  burgesses  of  Cambridge  might  be  free 
of  yereshive  and  scotale  if  the  King's  Sheriff  or  any  other 
Bailiff  had  made  scotale.  [Yereshive  or  Geares-Gifu 
was  an  annual  gift  or  exaction  commonly  required  by 
Sheriffs  :  Scot-ale  a  feast  at  which  only  the  Sheriff's  ale 
might  be  drunk.  In  a  second  Charter,  of  the  year  1207 
King  John  granted  the  farm  for  good  or  "  in  fee-farm."] 

XL  That  the  burgesses  might  have  all  other  liberties 
and  free  customs  which  they  had  in  the  time  of  the  King's 
ancestors,  when  they  had  them  better  or  more  freely. 

XII.  That  if  any  customs  should  be  unlawfully  levied 
in  war,  they  should  be  quashed. 


MONKS   AND    FRIARS  121 

XIII.  That  whosoever  should  come  to  the  borough  of 
Cambridge  with  his  merchandise,  of  whatever  place, 
whether  stranger  or  otherwise,  might  come,  tarry,  and 
return  in  safety,  and  without  disturbance,  rendering  the 
right  customs. 

XIV.  That  anyone  causing  injury,  loss  or  trouble,  to 
the  burgesses,  should  forfeit  £10  to  the  King. 

XV.  That  the  burgesses  and  their  heirs,  might  have 
and  hold  the  foregoing  liberties,  of  the  King  and  his 
heirs,  peaceably,  freely,  quietly,  entirely,  and  honour- 
ably in  all  things. 

In  this  year  1201  John  lodged  for  a  night 
or  so  at  Barnwell  Priory.  Its  Early  English 
Church  to  St.  Giles  and  St.  Andrew,  with  its 
central  tower,  unhappily  struck  by  lightning 
in  1287,  formed  the  heart  of  a  great  group  of 
buildings,  standing  amid  fields  and  groves 
by  the  waterside,  where  a  ferry  crossed  to 
Chesterton.  Behind  the  church  lay  Maids' 
Causeway,  while  between  road  and  river  stood 
the  farmery,  and  the  Canons'  land  stretched 
out  to  the  site  of  Stourbridge  Fair.  The  Fair 
brought  crowds  of  merchants  and  drovers, 
fishermen  with  oysters  and  herrings  from 
Colchester,  etc.,  whose  tolls  no  doubt  made  a 
good  sum. 

But  the  crowd  would  also  bring  beggars 
and  vagabonds,  as  the  races  do  now,  and 


122  LIFE   IN   OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

so  certain  Friars  of  St.  Mary  Magdalene 
set  up  a  refuge  for  those  most  miserable 
of  all  wanderers,  the  lepers.  Camp-followers 
of  the  Crusaders  spread  this  Eastern 
disease  all  over  Europe  at  this  time. 
Charity  for  their  distress  and  a  wise  care  for 
the  health  of  the  town  were  no  doubt  equal 
motives  for  the  rule  by  which  they  were  for- 
bidden to  pass  through  Barnwell  to  go  within 
two  miles  of  Cambridge.  King  John  sup- 
ported this  regulation  by  granting  to  the 
friars  the  dues  of  the  fair  to  be  held  in  the 
close  of  the  leper's  hospital  of  St.  Mary  Mag- 
dalene at  Stourbridge,  and  at  the  same  time 
authorised  the  Prior  and  Canons  of  Barnwell 
to  hold  Midsummer  Fair.  Stourbridge  Fair 
was  to  be  held  on  the  Vigil  and  Feast  of  Holy 
Cross,  which  would  begin  on  September  7th. 
By  Barnwell  Station  still  stands  the  hospital 
chapel  raised  by  those  friars,  a  solid  stone 
building  made  for  long  use,  but  with  the  rare 
decoration  of  a  hooded  doorway  and  windows 
with  fine  Norman  work.  Though  we  have  no 
lepers  now  we  might  well  use  it  for  other 
needs.  Many  are  glad  to  have  it  lit  and  cared 
for  in  God's  service  again. 


MONKS   AND    FRIARS  123 

Not  far  away  on  the  road  to  Ely  stood 
another  Norman  house  built  by  other  Bene- 
dictines, Denny  Abbey,  perhaps  the  finest 
piece  of  Norman  work  in  the  count}*- ;  it 
passed  into  the  hands  of  Templars,  and  later 
became  a  nunnery.     It  is  now  a  farmhouse. 

Much  later  than  the  Benedictine  monks  and 
Austin  Canons,  whose  houses  since  Saxon  Eng- 
land became  Christian  had  been  springing  up 
all  over  the  land,  there  had  come  to  Cambridge 
in  the  13th  century  new  streams  of  puritanic 
Christians,  the  friars.  Sworn  like  the  early 
monks  to  poverty,  they  differed  from  them 
in  their  aims,  which  were,  not  by  leaving  the 
world  to  rescue  their  own  souls,  or  by  cease- 
less prayers  to  atone  for  the  worldliness  of 
others,  but  to  go  about  the  world  doing  good 
and  preaching  to  the  poor.  Already  in  1201 
the  Friars  of  St.  Mary  Magdalene  were  caring 
for  the  lepers  at  Barnwell,  and  in  1224  the 
Grey  Friars  came  to  Cambridge.  These  had 
been  founded  by  the  devoted,  gentle  St. 
Francis  of  Assisi,  and  lived  in  the  Old  Syna- 
gogue ;  fifty  years  later  they  began  to  build 
"  a  noble  church  "  where  Sidney  Sussex  now 
is. 


124  LIFE    IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

These  Franciscans  were  vowed  to  complete 
poverty ;  and  in  Cambridge,  as  elsewhere,  they 
settled  in  the  poorest  quarter.  The  con- 
temporary account,  written  by  T.  of  Eccleston, 

says  : 

"  At  Cambridge  the  brethren  were  at  first  received  by 
the  burgesses  who  made  over  to  them  an  old  synagogue 
near  the  prison.  The  neighbourhood  of  the  prison,  how- 
ever, was  intolerable  to  the  brethren,  since  both  the}' 
and  the  gaolers  had  to  use  the  same  entrance  ;  so  our  lord 
the  King  gave  them  10  marks,  with  which  they  were 
able  to  buy  out  the  lease  from  the  Court  of  Exchequer. 
Then  they  built  a  chapel  so  very  poor  that  one  carpenter 
made  and  set  up  in  one  day  fourteen  pairs  of  rafters. 
So  on  the  feast  of  St.  Lawrence  (Aug.  10th),  though 
there  were  as  yet  but  three  brethren,  namely,  Brother 
William  of  Esseby,  and  Brother  Hugh  of  Bugeton, 
both  clerics,  and  a  novice  named  Brother  Elias,  who  was 
so  lame  that  he  had  to  be  carried  into  the  choir,  they 
sang  the  office  solemnly  according  to  note,  and  the 
novice  wept  so  much  that  the  tears  ran  freely  down  his 
face.  Now  this  novice  afterwards  died  a  most  holy 
death  at  York."  .  .  . 

"  The  first  guardian  of  Cambridge  was  Brother  Thomas, 
of  Spain/' 

"  The  custody  of  Cambridge  was  particularly  remark- 
able for  its  want  of  temporal  goods,  so  much  so  that  at 
the  time  of  his  first  Visitation  of  England,  Brother 
Albert  of  Pisa  found  the  brethren  ...  to  be  without 
mantles." 


MONKS   AND    FRIARS  125 

Other  reformers  followed,  the  Austin  Friars 
settling  on  Peashill,  the  Carmelites  or  White 
Friars  on  the  site  of  Queens'.  Before  the  end 
of  the  century  the  Pope's  "  Black  Dogs,"  the 
Dominicans,  took  up  their  place  outside 
Barnwell  Gate,  opposite  Dowdiver's  lane. 

The    Fairs 

In  the  commercial  as  well  as  the  religious 
life  of  Cambridge,  monks  and  friars  played 
their  part.  At  the  great  religious  festivals,  to 
which  pilgrims  from  all  parts  of  England  and 
from  abroad  used  to  flock,  fairs  were  held.  In 
Cambridge  there  were  four.  The  oldest  seems 
to  have  been  Midsummer  Fair,  held  "  from 
the  time  of  which  the  memory  of  man  does  not 
run."  The  name  suggests  that  it  may  even 
have  been  a  survival  of  pagan,  midsummer 
revels.  However  that  may  be,  this  fair  came 
under  the  sanction  of  the  church.  The  Prior 
and  convent  of  Barnwell  held  a  charter  from 
Henry  III.,  dated  1229,  giving  them  the  right 
to  hold  this  fair.  In  1298,  the  Prior  having 
seized  the  goods  of  a  felon  who  had  fled  from 
the  fair,  the  Mayor  challenged  his  jurisdiction  ; 


126  LIFE   IN   OLD   CAMBRIDGE 

but    the    following    agreement    was    reached 
between  them  : 

I.  That  all  who  lived  within  the  town  or  liberties  of 
Cambridge,  and  who,  according  to  the  custom  of  the 
town,  sustained  or  were  obliged  to  sustain  the  burdens 
arising  in  the  town,  as  in  watches,  tallages,  scotages, 
suits  of  court,  and  other  contributions,  should  be  free  in 
the  said  fair  of  stallage,  boothage  and  toll. 

II.  That  the  goods  of  thieves,  fugitives  and  cutpurses, 
if  any  such  should  be  thereafter  taken,  or  found  in  the 
said  Fair  by  the  Prior  or  his  bailiffs,  should  be  immedi- 
ately delivered  to  the  bailiffs  of  the  town,  and  that  the 
burgesses  of  Cambridge  should  indemnify  the  Prior  and 
Convent  for  so  doing. 

III.  That  all  who  live  in  the  town  and  liberties,  and 
do  not  bear  nor  are  obliged  to  bear  the  duties  or  perform 
the  services  before  mentioned,  should  be  as  much  obliged 
to  the  Customs  of  the  Fair  as  those  that  come  from  any 
other  place. 

This  agreement  left  the  Mayor  the  un- 
challenged authority  for  the  keeping  of  the 
peace  within  and  without  the  town.  In  the 
next  year  the  Prior's  right  to  hold  the  Fair 
at  all  was  inquired  into  by  the  king's  Itinerant 
Justices  under  the  act  of  "  Quo  Warranto," 
passed  twenty  years  earlier.  He  produced 
Henry  III.'s  charter,  and  his  right  was  allowed. 
It  seems  to  have  been  exercised  peacefully  for 
two  hundred  years  ;  then  in  1496,  "  the  Prior 


MONKS   AND   FRIAKS  12*7 

and  Convent  of  Barnwell  leased  for  one  year 
to  the  Mayor  and  bailiffs,  the  Fair  called 
Barnwell  Fair."1 

Another  fair,  said  to  have  been  called 
"  Garlic  Fair,"  was  granted  to  the  nuns  of 
St.  Rhadegund  and  held  in  the  summer. 

A  third  fair  is  said  by  Carter  to  have  been 
held  "  in  the  town  of  Cambridge  "  in  Rogation 
Week  ;  the  town  certainly  enjoyed  the  profits 
of  a  fair  held  at  Reach  in  that  week.  But  by 
far  the  most  important  fair  of  all  was  that  of 
Steersbrigge,  or  Stourbridge.  This  fair  had 
been  granted  by  King  John  to  the  Friars  of 
St.  Mary  Magdalene  for  the  support  of  the 
Leper  Hospital  which  they  had  built.  In 
early  times  this  fair  opened  on  the  7th  of 
September,  and  lasted  until  Michaelmas.  By 
the  time  of  Elizabeth,  it  begins  on  the  Feast 
of  St.  Bartholomew  the  Apostle,  i.e.  August 
24.  A  full  account  of  the  fair  is  given  by 
Carter : 

"  Near  half  a  mile  east  of  this  village  [Barnwell]  Stur- 
bridge  Fair  is  kept,  which  is  set  out  annually  on  St.  Bar- 
tholomew by  the  Mayor,  Aldermen,  and  the  rest  of  the 
Corporation  of  Cambridge  ;  who  all  ride  thither  in  a 
grand  procession,  with  music  playing  before  them,  and 

Cooper's  Annals  of  Cambridge. 


3?U*j  eJ  /5tflurWidm.Tair,take*)i72.S 


MONKS   AND    FRIARS  129 

most  of  the  boys  in  the  town  on  horseback  after  them, 
who,  as  soon  as  the  ceremony  is  read  over,  ride  races 
about  the  place  ;  when  returning  to  Cambridge  each  boy 
has  a  cake  and  some  ale  at  the  Town  Hall.  On  the  7th 
of  September  they  ride  in  the  same  manner  to  proclaim 
it ;  which  being  done,  the  Fair  begins,  and  continues 
three  weeks  ;  though  the  greatest  part  is  over  in  a  fort- 
night. 

§  14.  "  This  Fair,  which  was  thought  some  years  ago 
to  be  the  greatest  in  Europe,  is  kept  in  a  cornfield,  about 
half  a  mile  square,  having  the  River  Cam  running  on  the 
north  side  thereof,  and  the  rivulet  called  the  Stour  (from 
which  and  the  bridge  over  it  the  Fair  received  its  name) 
on  the  east  side,  and  it  is  about  two  miles  east  of  Cam- 
bridge market-place  ;  where,  during  the  Fair,  coaches, 
chaises,  and  chariots  attend  to  carry  persons  to  the  Fair. 
The  chief  diversions  at  Sturbridge  are  drolls,  rope- 
dancing,  and  sometimes  a  music-booth  ;  but  there  is  an 
Act  of  Parliament  which  prohibits  the  acting  of  plays 
within  fifteen  miles  of  Cambridge.1 

§  15.  "If  the  field  (on  which  the  Fair  is  kept)  is  not 
cleared  of  the  corn  by  the  24th  of  August,  the  builders 
may  trample  it  underfoot  to  build  their  booths  ;  and,  on 
the  other  hand,  if  the  same  be  not  cleared  of  the  booths 
and  materials  belonging  thereto  by  Michaelmas  Day  at 
noon,  the  plough-men  may  enter  the  same  with  their 
horses,  ploughs,  and  carts,  and  destroy  whatever  they 
find  on  the  premises.  The  filth,  dung,  straw,  etc.,  left 
behind  by  the  fair-keepers,  make  amends  for  their 
trampling  and  hardening  of  the  ground. 

1  This  Act  continued  to  be  enforced  till  the  middle  of  the 
nineteenth  century. 


130  LIFE   IN  OLD   CAMBRIDGE 

§  16.  "  The  shops  or  booths  are  built  in  rows  like 
streets,  having  each  their  name  ;  as  Gar  lick  Row,  Book- 
sellers'-row,  Cook-row,  etc.  And  every  commodity  has 
its  proper  place,  as  the  Cheese  Fair,  Hop  Fair,  Wool  Fair, 
etc.  ;  and  here,  as  in  several  other  streets  or  rows,  are  all 
sorts  of  traders,  who  sell  by  wholesale  or  retail,  as  gold- 
smiths, toy-men,  brasiers,  turners,  milliners,  haber- 
dashers, hatters,  mercers,  drapers,  pewterers,  china 
warehouses,  and,  in  a  word,  most  trades  that  can  be 
found  in  London,  from  whence  many  of  them  come. 
Here  are  also  taverns,  coffee-houses,  and  eating-houses 
in  great  plenty,  and  all  kept  in  booths,  in  any  of  which 
(except  the  coffee-booth)  you  may  at  any  time  be  ac- 
commodated with  hot  or  cold  roast  goose,  roast  or  boiled 
pork,  etc. 

§  17.  "  Crossing  the  main  road  at  the  south  end  of 
Gar  lick  Row,  and  a  little  to  the  left  hand,  is  a  great 
►Square,  formed  of  the  largest  booths,  called  the  Duddery, 
the  area  of  which  Square  is  from  240  to  300  feet,  chiefly 
taken  up  with  woollen  drapers,  wholesale  tailors,  and 
sellers  of  second-hand  clothes  ;x  where  the  dealers  have  a 
room  before  their  booths,  to  take  down  and  open  their 
packs,  and  bring  in  waggons  to  load  and  unload  the  same. 
In  the  centre  of  this  Square  was  (till  within  these  three 
years)  erected  a  tall  May-pole,  with  a  vane  at  the  top  ; 
and  in  this  Square,  on  the  two  chief  Sundays  during  the 
fair,  both  forenoon  and  afternoon,  Divine  Service  is  read, 

1  The  special  development  of  the  woollen  trade  in  this  fair  is 
said  (by  Fuller)  to  have  been  due  to  certain  traders  from  Kendal 
in  Westmorland  (famed  through  many  centuries  for  its  manu- 
facture of  cloth),  who  were  here  weather-bound  on  their  way  to 
the  great  entrepot  at  Norwich,  and  found  a  ready  sale  for  the 
goods  which  they  spread  out  to  dry. 


MONKS  AND   FRIARS  131 

and  a  sermon  preached  from  a  pulpit  placed  in  the  open 
air,  by  the  Minister  of  Barnwell ;  who  is  very  well  paid 
for  the  same  by  the  contribution  of  the  fair-keepers. 

§  18.  "In  this  Duddery  only,  it  is  said,  there  have 
been  sold  £100,000  worth  of  woollen  manufacturers  in  less 
than  a  week's  time  ;  besides  the  prodigious  trade  carried 
on  here,  by  the  wholesale  tailors  from  London,  and  most 
other  parts  of  England,  who  transact  their  business 
wholly  in  their  pocket-books,  and  meeting  here  their 
chapmen  from  all  parts,  make  up  their  accounts,  receive 
money  chiefly  in  bills,  and  take  further  orders.  These, 
they  say,  exceed  by  far  the  sale  of  goods  actually  brought 
to  the  Fair,  and  delivered  in  kind  ;  it  being  frequent  for 
the  London  wholesale  men  to  carry  back  orders  from 
their  dealers  for  £10,000  worth  of  goods  a  man,  and  some 
much  more.  And  once  in  this  Duddery,  it  is  said,  there 
was  a  booth  consisting  of  six  apartments,  all  belonging  to 
a  dealer  in  Norwich  stuffs  only,  who  had  there  above 
£20,000  worth  of  those  goods. 

§  19.  "  The  trade  for  wool,  hops,  and  leather  here  is 
prodigious  ;  the  quantity  of  wool  only  sold  at  one  fair  is 
said  to  have  amounted  to  £50,000  or  £60,000,  and  of 
hops  very  little  less. 

"  September  14,  being  the  Horse  Fair  da}',  is  the  day 
of  the  greatest  hurry,  when  it  is  almost  incredible  to  con- 
ceive what  number  of  people  there  are,  and  the  quantity 
of  victuals  that  day  consumed  by  them. 

"  During  the  Fair,  Colchester  oysters  and  white  her- 
rings, just  coming  into  season,  are  in  great  request,  at 
least  by  such  as  live  in  the  inland  parts  of  the  kingdom, 
where  they  are  seldom  to  be  had  fresh,  especially  the 
latter. 


132  LIFE    IN    OLD    CAMBRIDGE 

§  20.  "  The  Fair  is  like  a  well-governed  city  ;  and  less 
disorder  and  confusion  to  be  seen  there  than  in  any  other 
place  where  there  is  so  great  a  concourse  of  people  :  here 
is  a  Court  of  Justice  always  open  from  morning  till  night, 
where  the  Mayor  of  Cambridge,  or  his  Deputy,  sits  as 
Judge,  determining  all  controversies  in  matters  arising 
from  the  business  of  the  Fair,  and  seeing  the  Peace  there- 
of kept ;  for  which  purpose  he  hath  eight  servants,  called 
Red-coats,  attending  him  during  the  time  of  the  Fair  and 
other  public  occasions,  one  or  other  of  which  are  con- 
stantly at  hand  in  most  parts  of  the  Fair  :  and  if  any 
dispute  arise  between  buyer  and  seller,  on  calling  out 
'  Red-coat,'  you  have  instantly  one  or  more  come  running 
to  you  ;  and  if  the  dispute  is  not  quickly  decided,  the 
offender  is  carried  to  the  said  Court,  where  the  case  is 
decided  in  a  summary  way,  from  which  sentence  there 
lies  no  appeal. 

§  21.  "  About  two  or  three  days  after  the  Horse  Fair 
day,  when  the  hurry  of  the  wholesale  business  is  over,  the 
country  gentry  for  about  ten  or  twelve  miles  round  begin 
to  come  in  with  their  sons  and  daughters  ;  and  though 
diversion  is  what  chiefly  brings  them,  yet  it  is  not  a  little 
money  they  lay  out  among  the  tradesmen,  toy-shops, 
etc.,  besides  what  is  flung  away  to  see  the  puppet  shows, 
drolls,  rope-dancing,  live  creatures,  etc.,  of  which  there 
is  commonly  plenty. 

§  22.  "  The  last  observation  I  shall  make  concerning 
this  Fair  is,  how  inconveniently  a  multitude  of  people  are 
lodged  there  who  keep  it ;  their  bed  (if  I  may  so  call  it) 
is  laid  on  two  or  three  boards,  nailed  to  four  pieces  that 
bear  it  about  a  foot  from  the  ground,  and  four  boards 
round  it,  to  keep  the  persons  and  their  clothes  from  falling 


MONKS  AND   FRIARS  133 

off,  and  is  about  five  feet  long,  standing  abroad  all  day  if 
it  rains  not.  At  night  it  is  taken  into  their  booths,  and 
put  in  to  the  best  manner  they  can  ;  at  bed-time  they  get 
into  it,  and  lie  neck  and  heels  together  until  the  morning, 
if  the  wind  and  rain  do  not  force  them  out  sooner  ;  for  a 
high  wind  often  blows  down  their  booths,  as  it  did  a.d. 
1741,  and  a  heavy  rain  forces  through  the  hair-cloth  that 
covers  it. 

§  23.  "  Though  the  Corporation  of  Cambridge  has  the 
tolls  of  this  Fair,1  and  the  government  as  aforesaid,  yet 
the  body  of  the  University  has  the  oversight  of  the 
weights  and  measures  thereof  (as  well  as  at  Midsum- 
mer2 and  Reach  Fairs3)  and  the  licensing  of  all  show- 
booths,  live  creatures,  etc.  ;  and  the  Proctors  of  the 
University  keep  a  Court  there  also  to  hear  complaints 
about  weights  and  measures,  and  see  that  their  Gowns- 
men commit  no  disorders." 

The  great  concourse  of  people  to  this  fair 
brought  much  fame  and  profit  to  the  town, 
helping  to  spread  its  European  repute  of  the 

1  The  tolls  were  originally  granted  (by  King  John)  to  the 
Lepers'  Hospital  at  Stourbridge. 

2  Midsummer  Fair  is  held  on  Midsummer  Common,  between 
Cambridge  and  Barnwell,  and  was  of  old  connected  with 
Barnwell  Priory.     The  Common  derives  its  name  from  the  fair. 

8  Reach  is  situated  at  the  Fenward  extremity  of  the  Devil's 
Dyke,  and  is  about  seven  miles  from  Cambridge:  It  is  now 
quite  a  small  village,  but  its  position  made  it  a  place  of  great 
importance  in  early  times.  A  Roman  villa  has  been  unearthed 
there,  and  local  tradition  declares  that  the  place  once  possessed 
seven  churches.  Its  situation  at  the  River  Gate  of  the  Icenian 
and  East  Anglian  realms  must  have  made  it  from  the  first  a 
place  of  traffic,  and  its  Fair  remained  famous  for  many  centuries. 


134  LIFE   IN    OLD   CAMBRIDGE 

place  among  classes  other  than  merely  intel- 
lectual, especially  in  the  Empire  and  the  Low 
Countries,  where  the  sacks  of  English  wool 
were  worked  up  into  bales  of  cloth,  until 
English  merchants  began  to  compete  in  this 
stuff. 

With  the  Renaissance  and  the  religious 
changes  of  the  sixteenth  century,  the  system 
of  fairs  began  to  yield  place  to  the  use  of 
permanent  shops,  and  in  1516  the  burgesses  of 
Cambridge  got  control  of  Stourbridge  Fair. 
The  award  runs  "  the  mayor,  bailiffs  and 
burgesses  and  their  successors  for  evermore 
shall  have,  hold  and  enjoy,  keep  and  maintain 
the  said  fair  called  Stibridge  Fair  .  .  .  yearly 
from  the  feast  of  St.  Bartholomew  to  the  feast 
of  St.  Michael  the  Arcangel  in  September." 


JEftag  (A  /3tourtauWTa«:,taktt)i72  5 


c 


Index 


A. 

Aermeswerk    p.  39 

Africa     23, 28 

Akeman  Street     29 

Albert  of  Pisa     124 

Alderman     53,  57,  59,  69,  127 

Aldreth     78 

Alfred     57,  61 

Aller     57 

All  Saints     98 

„  by  the  Castle     98 
Almoner     109 
Alps     46 
Angles,   Angle-kin,   Anglians 

33,  37,  38,  39,  41,  50,  56, 

64 
Anna,  King  of  East  Anglia, 

c.  650     42,  43,  44,  50 
Arab     23 

Archaeological  Museum     26 
Ashdon     64 
Asia     23 

Assandun,  Battle  of     64,  65 
Athelney     57 
Augustine,  Benedictine  monk 

41 
Augustinian  Canons,  followers 

of  Augustine  of  Hippo  in 

Africa,  c.  410     91,  98 
Austin  (^  Augustinian)  Friars 

125 
Avebury  rings     8 
Aylwine,  bishop     76 


B. 

Babylon     12 

Bailey     88 

Balk,  a  grass  line  to  divide 
strips  of  ploughland     54 

Balsham     13,  62 

Bardsey     47 

Barking     44 

Barnwell     10,91,92,94,102, 
121,  125 
„  field     39 
„  Fair     94 
„  Gate     100 

Barrington     63 

Beakers     10 

Bede,  the  Venerable,  a  Bene- 
dictine monk,  first  Eng- 
lish historian     41,  49 

Bedford     3 

Benedictine     49,  123 

Berkshire  downs     8,  25 

Bishops     29,  32,  70 

Black  Death     98 

Blackwater  River     59 

Booksellers'  Row     130 

Borough     88,  92 

Bottisham     46,  113 

Boudica  (Boadicea)     20 

Bourn  Manor     88 

Bourne  Rivulet     64 

Bradmore  Field     39 

Brand  Ditch     13 

Brandon    3,  6,  13,  77 


135 


136 


INDEX 


Brakelands     6 

Brent  Ditch     13 

Bretwalda     4 1 

Bridge  Street     100 

Brie,   town   in   N.E.   France 

44,45 
Brihtmer  Budde     66 
Britain     11,   15,   16,   17,   21, 

28,  31,  33 
Brithnoth     59,  60,  62 
British  Thieves     41,  43 
Britons     11,   13,   18,  20,  26, 

29,  31,  33,  38 

„  Groans  of  the     32 
Bronze  Age     6 
Bruneswald     84 
Bucks     56 
Budde     66 
Bullhithe  Gate     76 
Burgesses     116,  119-21 
Burwell     99 
Bury  St.  Edmunds     50,  56 

c. 

Caesar     15,  16,  22,  25,  31 

Cam     1,  5,  37,  38,  64,  75 

Cambridge-shire  5,  6,  13, 
20,  23,  31,  32,  33,  34,  45, 
50,  51,  55,  56,  57,  58,  62, 
68,74,  113,  121-138 

Camps     11,  12,  21,30 

Canons     92,  102 

Canterbury     44 

Caradoc     17,  19 

Carme  Field     39 

Carmelites     125 

Castle     86-8,  91 
„  hill     1,  29,  30 


Caswallon     17 
Causeway     77,  78,  86 
Celtic     46 
Centurion     26 
Chamberlain     111 
Chapter     107,  112 
Chariot     25 
Charlemagne     47 
Charter     94,  117,  126 
Cheese  Fair     130 
Chester     20,  21 
„  ford     20,  38 
„  ton     29,  38,  92,  121 
„  ton  Lane     22,  88 
Chilterns     8, 56 
China     12 
Christian     26-8,   32,   41,   43, 

44 
Christien     65,  75,  123 
Church     28, 72 
thatched     89 
Cloister     104 
Cloth     131  note 
Cnut     65-7 
Coe  Fen     102 
Cohort     29 

Colchester     20,  100,  121,  131 
Compline     104 
Confessor,   Edward  the     68, 

74 
Conquest,   the  Norman     74, 

75 
Constantine,      Emperor      of 

Rome,  a.d.  305     29 
Constantinople     29 
Cook-row     130 
Corporation     127,  133 
Cottenham     26 


INDEX 


137 


Count   of   the   Saxon   Shore 

21,  29,  55 
Court  of  Exchequer     124 

„  Justice     132 
Crowland  Abbey     45,  47 
Croxton     61 
Crucks,  crutches     35 
Crusade,    crusaders     92,    93, 

96,  122 
Curtain  walls     88 
Cymbeline     17 

D. 

Danes     55-7,  59,  61-2,  64 
Danish     74,  75 
Daub     35-7,  8S 
Decurion,  a  Roman  taxpayer 

26,  32 
Denny  Abbey     123 
Devil's  Dyke     13 
Domesday  Book     68,  90,  95 
Dominican  Friars     125 
Domitian     28 
Donjon     87 
Dorsetshire     57 
Dorter     103-7 
Dowdiver's  Lane     125 
Downing  College     102 
Downs     1 1 

„  Berkshire     8 
Duddery     130 
Dykes     12,13,17,18,19,43 

E. 

Earl     74,  96 
„  Edwin     76 
,,  Morkar     76 
,,  Osbern    75 


East  Anglia     3,   17,  41,  43, 

45,  50,  58 
Eboracum     29 
Eccleston,  Thomas  of     124 
Edmund  Ironside     64 
Ednoth,  Bishop     64 
Edward    the    Elder,    son    of 

Alfred     57,  58 
Edward    the    Confessor     68, 

74 
Egbert  of  Wessex     50,  51 
Ely     1,  44,  45,  47,  48,  61,  65 
„    Isle  of   22,  48,  64  66,  75- 

86,  113 
„  Thomas  of     77 
Empire,  Holy  Roman     134 
English     15,  34,  93,  96 
East     62,  64 

Ergastula,  barracks  for  Ro- 
man slave -labourers     23 
Erkenwald,  son  of  Anna     44 
Ermine  Street     18,  22,  29,  33 

50 
Ethandune     57 
Ethelbert  of  Kent     41 
Etheldreda  (St.  Awdrey)    43, 

44,  47,  48,  115 
Ethelfled     58 
Ethelred     60 
Europe     5,  10,  129 
Everard  de  Beche     94 
Exchequer     117 
Exning     43 

F. 

Farm  of  the  town     116 
Farmery     91,  111 
Fee-farm  of  the  town       118 


138 


INDEX 


Fens     13,  23,  41,  47,  50 

FenDitton     13 

Flanders,    Flemish     47,    23, 

25,  45 
Fleam  Dike     12,  13 
Folkmoot  (see  Moot)     51 
Ford     5,  22,  36,  38 

„  Field     39 
Forum,     a     Roman    market 

square     21,  23,  26 
France     16,  41,  72 
Franciscans     123-4 
Frank,   French     41,   45,   75, 

80 
Frater     94,  103,  108 
Friars,  Austin     115 

,,  Minor     124-5 

„  White     125 

„  Dominican     125 

,,  of    St.   Mary    Magdalene 
122 

G. 

Galley     16,  21 
Garlic  Fair     98 

„  Row     130 
Gatehouse     88,  94 
Gates  of  Cambridge     100 
Gaul     15,  21,  30,  32 
Germania,  Germany     23,  25, 

37,  47,  48 
Gild  of  Thanes     68-72 

,,  Merchants     119 
Girvii     42,  48 
Godesone     93 
Godmanchester     20,  22 
Godwin     74 
Gogs     5,6,18,50 


Golden  Dragon  banner     64 

Goths     29 

Gownsmen     133 

Grainger     110 

Grant,  Grantebrigge  62,  68-9. 

Grantchester     1 1 

Grey  Friars     123 

Grimes  Graves     6 

Grithow  Field     39 

Groans  of  the  Britons     32 

Guy     82 


H. 

Hadstock  Way     100 
Hallelujah  Victory     32 
Hardwicke     61 
Harold     74 

Hastings,  Battle  of     74 
Hayward     54 
Headland     54 
Helvetia     23 
Henry  I.     48,  92-3,  97 

,,  writ  of     113 

„  II.      115 

„  III.     97,  125 

„  Frost     98 
Hereward  the  Wake     75-85, 

113 
Heriot     68,  95 
High  Stone  Cross     88 
Holy  Land     93 

,,  Sepulchre     95 
Hop  Fair     130 
Horse  Fair     130-1 
Hospital  of  St.  John     98 
Hosteller     110 
House-penny     53 


INDEX                                       135: 

Hundred     58 

Lindisfarne     47 

„  moot     52 

Little  Field     39 

Huntingdon     88,  100 

Little  St.  Mary's     102 

Hypocaust     25 

Londinium,  London     22,  30 

44,  95,  130-1 

I. 

Long  Stanton     89 

Ickenham     50,  89 

Louver,  Louvre     89 

Icknield  Way     18 

Low  Countries     134 

Iceni     11,15,17-19,27 

Impington     61 

Iona     47 

M. 

Ireland     32,  47 
Irish     8,  9,  46 

Magdalene  College     39 

,,  Bridge     51,  115 

Iron  Age     10 

„  Wharf     51,  100 

Italy     23,  29,  52,  72 

Maids'  Causeway     102,  121 

J. 

Maldon,  Battle  of     59 

Mandeville,  Galfrid  de     99 

Jarl     74 

Mark     37 

„  Gyrth     74 

Market  Hill     51 

Jesus  College     98 

Matilda     99 

Jews     96,  97 

Mayor     125,  132 

John     94,  119-122 

Maypole     130 

Melbourne     13 

K. 

Merchant  Gild     119 

Keep     37 

Mercians     37-8,  41-2,  44,  50 

Kent     16, 57 

53,64 

Kenwulf     57 

Merton  Hall     22,  89 

King's  Ditch     100 

Michaelmas     127,  129 

Middle  Field     39 

L. 

Midsummer  Eve     94 

Lageman     57 

„  Fair     122,  133 

Landbeach     46 

Mill  Lane     100 

Lay  -  brethren     112 

Mills     100,  101 

Lea  river     57 

Milne  Street     100 

Legions     17,  18,  30 

Minister  of  Barnwell     130 

Lepers     122,  127,  133 

Mint     68 

Librarian     104 

Moat     100 

Lichneld     49 

Moot     52,  53,  57,  72 

140 


INDEX 


N. 

Nero     28 

Newmarket     1 3 

Newnham    Elde    Newenham 

39 
New  Stone  Age     6 
Norfolk     2,  6,  12,  37,  58 
Norman     48,   74-86,   89,   91, 

99,  113,  122,  123 
North  Sea     47,  55 
Northumbria     44 
Norwich     131 
Novices     105 
Nunnery     98 

0. 

Old  White  Horse  Inn     88 
Ostorius  Scapula     18 
Ouse  River     1,  3,  35,  77 
Outlaws     78,  84 
Owen     48 
Oxen     6,  25,  94 

P. 

Pain  Peverel     92 
Parrot  River     57 
Papworth     61 
Peas  Hill     51 
Pembroke  Street     100 
Penda     43,  44 
Peterborough     45,  47,  75 
Peterhouse     89 
Peverel     92,  93,  95 
Picts     30,  33 
Pilgrims'  Way     50 
Pit-dwellings     4 
Pottery     6,  25 
Praetorium     26 
Precentor  (see  Librarian) 


Prolate     102-3 
Prior  (see  Prelate)     94 
Proctors     133 
Provost     103 
Processions     107,  127 

Q. 

Queens'  College     89,  100 
Quire     104 

R. 

Ralph  the  Bearded     95 
Ramsey  Abbey     44 
Raven  banner     55 
Reach     14,77,113,133 
Redcoat     130 
Redwald     41 
Reeve     51,  55,  120 
Ridgeways     8,  12 
Ringmere,  Battle  of     61,  62 
Robert  of  Normandy     92 
Rogation    Week    Fair     120, 

127 
Rome     20,  30,  44,  84 
Roman     15,     17-19,     29-33, 
54-5 

„  Peace     22,  30 

„  Villa     133  note 
Round  Church     95,  96 
Royston     3,  6 

s. 

Saint  Andrew's  Hill     51,  93, 

94,  121 
,,  Anselm     98 
„  Atheldritha    (see    Ethel - 

dreda) 
„  Audrey  (see    Etheldreda) 

48 


INDEX 


141 


Saint  Augustine     72 
,,  Bartholomew's  Day     127 
, ,  Benet's  Church     68 
,,  Brice's  Church     61 
, ,  Edmund's  Chapel     94 
„  Etheldreda  43,  44,  47,  48 
,,  Felix  of  Burgundy     42 
,,  Francis  of  Assisi     123 
„  Giles'    Church   22,    91-4, 

99,  121 
„   Hilda     44 
„  Ives     58 

,,  John  Baptist's  Eve     92 
,,   Lawrence     124 
,,  Mary's  Chapel     50 
,,  Mary       Magdalene,      the 

Friars  of     122 
„   Patrick     32 
„  Paul     27-8 
„  Peter's  Church     22,  99 
,,  Rhadegund     98 
,,  Thomas'  Leas     102 
Saracenic,     of    the     Moslem 

Empire     64 
Saxon  shore,   coast  of  East 
Anglia     21,   29,   31,   33, 
41,  55,  72,  74 
Saxony,  on  the  N.W.  coast  of 

Germany     47 
Scapula,  Ostorius     27 
Scotale     120 

Scots,     natives     of     Ireland 
during       the        Roman 
period     32 
Scotland,        inhabited        by 

Beakermen     10 
Seaxe,  pi.    seaxas,   a   Saxon 
dagger  blade     34 


Sedrida,    daughter    of    King 

Anna     44 
Saxburga,  daughter  of  King 

Anna     44 
Sheriff     68,  100,  113,  115-6, 

118,  120 
„  Guy     83 
„  Picot     88,  91 
Sidney  Sussex     96,  123 
Sigebert,  second  son  of  Red- 

wald     41 
Silchester,    a    great    Roman 

Town     30 
Silver  Street     95 
Siward  Barn,  a  Saxon  Noble  76 
Siwulf ,  Alderman  of  Kent    57 
Slaves,  Roman     22 
Soham     42,46,65-6,113 
Soler,  a  private  room     89 
Stamford     33 
Stephen     98 
Stone  users     8 
Stonehenge     8 
Stourbridge  Fair    121-2,  127- 

133 
Suffolk     2,  6,  12,  34,  37-8 
Sub-prior     103 
Sumersham,  Somersham     82 
Swallow,  Hereward's  mare  79 
Sweyn,  Sweyne     61,  62,  75 
Synagogue     123 

T. 

Templars     95,  123 
Terra  Sigillata     25 
Teuton     47 
Teversham     61 
Thames  river     3,  11,  13,  17, 
35,  44,  56,  64 


142 


INDEX 


Thanes     68-72,  96 
Thatch,  use  of     4,  37,  88 
Thetford     56 
Thomas  of  Eccleston     124 

„  of  Spain     124 
Thor,  a  Norse  god     38,  43 
Thorney  Abbey     45 
Thorold     75 
Three  Tuns  Inn     88 
Tithe     53 
Tithings     58 
Toft,  a  private  enclosed  piece 

of  ground     37 
Toga,  a  Roman  robe     26 
Tonbert     44 
Trumpington     51 

„  Gate     100,  102 

u. 

Uffing,  name  of  a  royal  family 

of  Angles     4 1 
Ulfcytel  the  Ready     62,  65 
University     133 

V. 

Vandlebury,  a  British  and 
Roman  Camp     18,  22 

Venta  Belgarum, Roman  name 
of  Winchester,  capital  (a) 
of  the  Belgae,  (6)  of  the 
West  Saxons  30 

Via  Appia,  a  Roman  road  in 
S.  Italy     27 

Viking     57,  59,  60,  74 

Villa     21-4,  30,  33 

Vineyards     23,  33 

w. 

Wall,  the  North  Wall  29, 30, 32 
Walloon,  a  tribe  in  Flanders  23 
Walsingham     50 


Wash     1,5,11,45 

Wards,  High     96,  100 

Warden  (see  Prelate) 

Waterbeach     1,  46 

Watermerchants     7 1 

Watling  Street,  a  Roman  road 
from  Kent  to  Chester, 
etc.     29,  57 

Wattle,  hurdle  work  of  twigs 
36,  88 

Way     3,  13,  49 

Wales     19,  32 

Welsh     69 
,,  Marches,  the  frontier  be- 
tween Wales  and  Eng- 
land    29 

Wessex     58,  64 

Whitby     44 

Wide  Sea     30,46,71 

William  I.     75,  78,  84-5 
„  ofEsseby     124 
,,  of  Malmesbury     96 

Willingham     78 

Winchester     30 

Winford     49 

Winwaed,  Battle  of,  655  a.d. 
43 

Witan     59 

Woden  or  Odin,  Father  of  the 
Norse  gods     38,  43 

Wolf  Street  Way     13  note 

WoodDitton     14 

Worsted  Street     13 

Wolves     53 

Wool  Fair     130,  131  note 

Y. 

Yare  river     35 

York,  -shire     29,  56,  75,  124 


Printed  by  W.  Heffer  &  Sons  Ltd.,  Cambridge,  England. 


Dat    F% 


UC  SOUTHERN  REGIONAL  LIBRARY  FACILITY 


A  A        001  387  002        7 


